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

Helene watch: Elon Succeeds Where Feds Failed

“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Recall that in 2022, the Federal Communications Commission rescinded a deal to install Musk’s Starlink receivers in rural towns (including ones now hit by the storm) to provide internet access.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.”

Libertarian: Grade Inflation Gone Rampant

“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.”

Foreign desk: Israel’s Democratic War

“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 future.”

Ignore the “mainstream-media narrative” that this is basically “Bibi’s war.”

And beware: “The anti-Israel crusade in Europe and America has brought together all that is worst within our democracies,” but “those of us who want to stand up for our democratic civilization, warts and all, should stand foursquare with the Israelis.”

Eye on NY: Hochul’s Medicaid-Hustle Secrecy

“The Hochul administration has requested federal approval for a multibillion-dollar ‘MCO tax’ on health plans without announcing the move or providing details to the public,” grumbles the Empire Center’s Bill Hammond.

Although “the Health Department submitted a plan for the tax to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services” that offered specifics, the Empire Center was told “the MCO Provider Tax Plan is not publicly available.”

The tax is a gimmick meant to milk free money from the feds, but major questions about where the cash would go, and the possible risks involved, “should have been addressed before Governor Hochul and the Legislature moved ahead.”

And the tax “could be applied retroactively as early as July 1.”

From the right: Harris’ Record of Failure

“Billions of taxpayer dollars spent for nothing” is “exactly the sort of thing Harris promises she will do more of, at even greater cost, should she be elected president,” smirks the Washington Examiner’s Byron York.

Consider her leadership of “the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program,” meant “to bring internet service to ‘unserved and underserved’ rural areas.”

To date, “not a single person has been connected to the internet using the $42.45 billion allocated.”

And her “work on expanding the number of charging stations for electric vehicles”: With funding of “$7.5 billion for the construction of around 5,000 electric vehicle charging stations,” Harris only managed to squeeze out “seven new charging stations in the entire United States.”

Behind the failure? “Too many regulations on projects” and “the broad diversity, equity, and inclusion requirements” that Harris demands “on everything the government does.”

— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board