Elon succeeds where feds failed, grade inflation gone rampant and other commentary

“Countless” people, like Elon Musk, stepped up to help after Hurricane Helene even as (some say) the feds were actually hindering efforts, report The Free Press’ Joe Nocera & Madeleine Rowley.Recall that in 2022, the Federal Communications Commission rescinded a deal to install Musk’s Starlink receivers in rural towns (including ones now hit by the storm) to provide internet access.Commissioner Brendan Carr in dissent blamed Team Biden’s “pattern of regulatory harassment” of Musk.Yet few have “done more for the country’s economy” than Musk did via SpaceX and Tesla alone.Fact is, during natural disasters, the government always moves slower than private individuals.Presidents “turn their backs” on people like Musk at the country’s “peril.”“While grade inflation is continuing to drive high school grades up, students are slipping on more objective measures of learning,” warns Reason’s Emma Camp.“Student GPA in the post-COVID-19 era has declined in its power to predict student success in college,” while “standardized test scores stayed relatively stable in their ability to predict” such success.This shows “grade inflation is rampant, and colleges should turn back toward standardized testing in admissions if they want to reliably predict which student will be able to handle the rigors of college.”Indeed, multiple top schools “have reinstated standardized testing requirements” — but most colleges remain “still test-optional, or even test-free, with more than 2,000 out of around 2,600 institutions ditching standardized tests.”“Two weeks ago, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the world that ‘We are winning’.

And he was right,” cheers Mick Hume at Spiked.How has Israel pulled off such success? This is a “people’s war,” “supported by millions who identify with and have a stake in the Jewish State, and view its existential struggle against the Islamists as a fight for their own heritage and futu...