Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Woolley Show on 1370 Talk Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. Many dreams died last week with Texas’ big loss on the opening day of college football, and the list got longer when the Second Called Special Session of the Texas Legislature adjourned with a hefty list of unfinished business. I’m still sifting through all that and, as promised, it will be a short list this week, but I want to acknowledge a couple big winners.
WINNER: Texas Tech University Names Creighton
Texas Tech announced this week that Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, has been named the sole finalist to become the next Chancellor of Texas Tech University.
Creighton, the author of Senate Bill 17, which closed down so-called Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) offices on all Texas public university campuses, ended DEI training and the requirement that all employees pledge fealty to DEI before they could be hired, set the national standard for higher education reform. This session, with Creighton’s absolutely fearless leadership, Senate Bill 37 scuttled the power of the noisy, often left-leaning faculty senates that lorded it over campuses statewide. With the backing of Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, Creighton’s legislation strengthened the roles of the Boards of Regents, appointed by the governor and empowered by the Texas Constitution, to run taxpayer-funded universities.
Universities have been the Wuhan Wet Labs of woke for decades — everything bad originates there, starting with hatred for America rooted in contempt for all Western thought. Plus, there’s all the theories — critical race theory, gender theory, intersectionality theory — that had become required courses for many Texas students. If you wonder how all this junk got into our public schools, it’s because universities are training public school teachers.
Texas university systems are massive — seven multi-billion dollar flagships, often blindly supported by thousands of alumni who have no idea what is actually going on in the classrooms. Creighton saw what was happening and took it all on — starting the process of unraveling the left-wing ideological straight-jacket that was hampering free speech, open inquiry and the growth and achievement of every student on Texas campuses.
Creighton has laid down the framework for a return to merit-based achievement and a focus on successful outcomes for every Texas kid — a path to ultimately get rid of the ideological blight that has corroded our university systems. Texas Tech is a big winner.
WINNER: We’re Number 4! We’re Number 4!
It’s always tricky to figure out how these Wallet Hub reports are calculated, but its latest names Texas as the 4th hardest working state in the nation, after North Dakota, Alaska and South Dakota. It reports that Texans are second only to Alaskans in working more than 40 hours per week. The Dakotas get into the top spot because there’s no unemployment in either of those states — of course, there’s not very many people either. We could complain about the referees, but we have too much hard work to do. Let’s just take the W, such as it is.
WINNER: Squad Member Ilhan Omar Marries Money
In 2023, Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minnesota, reported a net worth of $51,000 on her congressional financial disclosure report. This year, she reported $30 million as a result of her marriage to her campaign consultant, Tim Mynett. Mynett was broke when she met him, but he seems to be doing well now (except for a few lawsuits and a couple of Federal Election Commission complaints). It’s a great rags to riches story — you can read it here.
Omar, of course, is not the first Democrat to demonstrate how to make money from public office. Remember when the Clintons and the Obamas didn’t have any money? Now they both have a half dozen homes each. I wonder how they did it?
LOSER: New York City
It was fun news earlier this week when the rumor that a Clinton and a Kennedy were both eyeing the congressional seat held by Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-New York, after Nadler announced he was stepping down. With Zohran Mamdani leading all the polls, no matter what they do, Democrats seem to be trying to recycle their greatest hits to prove they aren’t communists. Chelsea Clinton has already backed out, but Jack Schlossberg, grandson of the late president John F. Kennedy, is still in the race to represent New York City’s upper west side in Congress — the last bastion of white liberalism. Mamdani announced plans this week to raise taxes on residents earning more than $1 million annually, raising corporate tax rates and instituting a city-wide rent freeze. One more reason to be thankful we live in Texas.
In Other News —
I was interviewed about U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon’s proposal to challenge the American Bar Association’s exclusive role in accrediting law schools — which definitely needs to be challenged. My comments were picked up several places — here’s one of the clips.
I also talked with KTRH Radio about the Bluebonnet Curriculum in public schools, which is getting a lot of blowback from the media because it includes some Bible references as part of our cultural history. Here’s a clip.
WINNER: College Football
Even with the defeat of the Longhorns in Columbus last week, college football season had a great opening week with more to come on Saturday. The now-7th ranked University of Texas will take on San Jose State in Austin, while Texas A&M, ranked 19th, will travel to Utah State. The Red Raiders, ranked 24th, will play Kent State in Ohio.
Have a great weekend.