Governor Youngkin Says New Report Shows That Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative Is Carbon Tax Passed on to Consumers

Glenn Youngkin

Governor Glenn Youngkin is trying to withdraw Virginia from participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI,) and the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) published a Youngkin-ordered report on the program, which requires utilities to bid on carbon dioxide allowances.

“Costs are soaring for Virginia families and as governor, I pledged to address over taxation and Virginia’s high cost of living. That’s why I signed Executive Order Nine to direct DEQ to examine the impact of RGGI and start the process of ending Virginia’s participation. This report reveals that RGGI is in reality a carbon tax passed on to families, individuals and businesses throughout the Commonwealth – it’s a bad deal for Virginians,” Youngkin said in a press release Tuesday.

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Commentary: 10 Realities of Ukraine

skyline of Kyiv, Ukraine

One. Reassuring an enemy what one will not do ensures that the enemy will do just that and more. Unpredictability and occasional enigmatic silence bolster deterrence. But Joe Biden’s predictable reassurance to Russian President Vladimir Putin that he will show restraint means Putin likely will not. 

Two. No-fly zones don’t work in a big-power, symmetrical standoff. In a cost-benefit analysis, they are not worth the risk of shooting down the planes of a nuclear power. They usually do little to stop planes outside of such zones shooting missiles into them. Sending long-range, high-altitude anti-aircraft batteries to Ukraine to deny Russian air superiority is a far better way of regaining air parity.

Three. Europe, NATO members, and Germany in particular have de facto admitted that their past decades of shutting down nuclear plants, coal mines, and oil and gas fields have left Europe at the mercy of Russia. They are promising to rearm and meet their promised military contributions. By their actions, they are admitting that their critics, the United States in particular, were right, and they were dangerously wrong in empowering Putin.

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Corey DeAngelis: More School Choice Creates Greater Incentive for Teachers’ Unions to Push Student-Focused Policies

Corey DeAngelis of the American Federation for Children

In an interview with The Star News Network, nationally known school choice advocate Corey DeAngelis said teachers’ unions would be incentivized to push for more student-focused policies in public schools if school funding followed the child and more states adopted school choice programs.

DeAngelis, the national director of research at the American Federation for Children, is also an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute, and a senior fellow at the Reason Foundation.

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Commentary: Slimy Liz Cheney All but Begging Wyoming Dems to Help Her Battle Trump

Liz Cheney

No one ever said that the business of politics made good sense, but if you’re a politician, and the vast majority of your constituents — including a high percentage of those in your own party — no longer want you to represent them, shouldn’t you take their distaste as a hint and get the heck out of office?

Such is the case for notorious Donald Trump bashing RINO congresswoman Liz Cheney. As everyone knows by now, Cheney is the lone House representative from the huge but sparsely populated state of Wyoming, which means hers is the sole voice of every single Cowboy State resident and citizen in the lower chamber. Liz has never had an issue with winning elections in blood red Wyoming, which would seem to be an argument in her favor. But times and circumstances have changed markedly in the rocky mountain high plains and there’re hardly any folks there who hanker to send Cheney back to DC for another two years.

Yet onward Liz trudges. Because Cheney has fallen so far out of favor with conservatives and Republicans in her jurisdiction, she’s now relying on Democrats to try and (literally) save her seat. The optics alone are odd, but reality is even weirder. In a piece titled “Liz Cheney turns to Democrats to save her hide,” Tara Palmeri wrote at Politico:

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BLM Activist and Husband Face Federal Fraud Charges After Using Nonprofit Donations on Lavish Lifestyle

A Boston-based BLM activist and her husband are accused of bilking taxpayers and liberal donors out of hundreds of thousands of dollars to use on vacations, restaurants, and trips to the nail salon.

The pair reportedly went on the spending spree using unemployment benefits, and donation funds of the non-profit organization “Violence in Boston.”

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Left-Wing Democrats Ask Biden to Cancel Oil Drilling on Federal Lands, Declare ‘Climate Emergency’

The Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC), a group of 97 left wing lawmakers, urged President Joe Biden to declare a “climate emergency” and issue a series of bans on federal oil and gas leasing.

The requests were part of the CPC’s proposed agenda for executive action released Thursday that it would like to see the White House pursue moving forward. Democratic Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal is the caucus’ chair and Sen. Bernie Sanders is its sole member from the Senate.

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Virginia Association of School Superintendents President Acknowledges Letter Criticizing Youngkin Represents Only ‘the Majority of Our Board’

Superintendent of Wyoming Jillian Balow

A letter published last Friday on behalf of Virginia’s school superintendents to Superintendent of Public Instruction Jillian Balow represents a majority of the Virginia Association of School Superintendents (VASS) board, not the feelings of all 133 superintendents, VASS President Dr. Zebedee Talley, Jr. told John Reid on WRVA on Wednesday. The letter criticized the Youngkin administration’s removal of equity material, and Democrats and initial media reports suggested that the letter represented unanimous support from the superintendents. That led to a week of outcry from Virginia Republicans and conservative media.

“I think people have taken this and just gone way off course,” Talley told Reid.

“It simply expresses some concerns, and it is not all 133 superintendents who feel this way. If you get ten people in the room, you know, two people don’t agree on everything,” Talley said.

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