Every Friday morning, I join the Cardle & Wooley Show on Talk 1370 Radio in Austin to announce the week’s Winners & Losers. In a week marked by an historic peace accord in the Middle East and Portland, Oregon’s naked bike ride to protest the National Guard in their city, here’s who made the list:
WINNER: Trump Really Deserves the Nobel Prize Now!
Writing Winners & Losers on Friday is always a challenge in those weeks when President Donald Trump has accomplished something monumental early in the week because, by the end of the week, America’s left-leaning news establishment will have hopelessly distorted the event. There is no doubt that Trump brokered an historic peace between Israel and Hamas. During the broadcast of the meeting in Egypt where the ceasefire was signed, a CNN reporter noted that Trump’s appearance on stage with all the major players in the Middle East and the many European leaders behind him amounted to “pretty much the whole ball game.” She didn’t sound happy.
By Thursday, in a move that was not a joke, former President Joe Biden’s Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, had the temerity to suggest that the Biden administration had actually laid the groundwork for the peace accord. Apparently, Blinken is unaware that many people believe that if Trump had been president instead of Biden, Hamas would not have attacked Israel and started the war in the first place. They also seem to have forgotten that their presidential candidate, Kamala Harris, could never quite bring herself to condemn Hamas for the attack, without also blaming Israel.
LOSER: Democrats Losing Shutdown Messaging War
In the beginning, it looked like the Democrats might have finally landed on an effective message for themselves by insisting they were shutting down the government to reduce health care costs—because people are increasingly concerned about the rising costs of medical bills. But we are now more than two weeks into the shutdown, and polling data shows that voters overwhelmingly blame Democrats for the shutdown. They don’t trust Democrats to address health care costs, or with any economic issue.
National Democrat leaders haven’t gotten the memo yet that their shutdown message is failing. They continue to filibuster incessantly.
WINNER: White House Says No to Texas GOP Ballot Ban
The Texas Senate Republican Executive Committee (SREC) ultimately did not pass resolutions this past weekend to censure Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows and several other Texas Republican lawmakers, a move that could have resulted in their being blocked from the Republican primary ballot next year.
Although the SREC insists the high profile call didn’t matter to them, news circulated during the meeting that the White House was watching the livestream. Ultimately, White House Political Director Matt Brasseaux weighed in, saying the White House did not support banning anyone from the ballot. Reportedly, Brasseaux added that it should be up to the voters, not the executive committee, to decide which candidates will appear on primary election ballots.
One of the challenges of a democracy is to always affirm that voters are smart enough to know who they want to vote for. Last week, I reported that at least one progressive pollster believes Democrats should ignore what voters say in opinion polls because voters don’t know what they are talking about—so their opinions shouldn’t matter.
That kind of thinking could bring down Democrats—but it could bring down Republicans, too. What the White House political director said is a foundational principle that the SREC should reaffirm—anyone can run for office who is eligible, and voters get to pick the candidate who wins.
WINNER: Building Icebreakers in Texas
U.S. Senator Ted Cruz is a winner this week for getting a provision added to the big budget bill in July that will ramp up construction of the heavy icebreaker ships that are capable of navigating through the polar regions. Lots of countries increasingly care about the polar regions, not only for security reasons but also because of rare earth metal resources. Currently, China has four of these icebreaking ships and Russia has more than 40. The U.S. has two that are operational, including the Polar Star, which was commissioned in 1976.
Cruz’s legislative addition will result in the construction of seven more icebreakers, including three that will be built in Galveston, which Cruz boasts will create about 7,000 jobs. The contracts were awarded last week so everything is ready to go.
LOSER: Where Did the Non-Binary People Go?
Among the many awful things that seemed to happen during COVID and the 2020 riots was that the number of young people who called themselves non-binary—neither a man or a woman—increased dramatically. If you haven’t watched it, comedian Bill Maher created an hysterical spoof in 2022 showing at on the current trajectory, by 2054 everyone will be gay.
But this week we got the news that an academic at the University of Buckingham has been looking at polls from around the U.S.—primarily university surveys—that show a substantial decline in the number of young people who call themselves non-binary. In some places it is as low as 2%, down from 5.2% last year, and the all time high of 6.8% in 2023. It’s a big loser for the trans community, but it is a big win for the obvious.
LOSER: California’s Billions on Homelessness
California has reportedly spent $24 billion to end homelessness, but they still have the worst homeless problem in the country. Tented homeless camps in Los Angeles and San Francisco have become infamous. I always assumed that the Democrats who run everything in the Golden State had just wasted billions of dollars targeted for homelessness on dumb ideas like buying needles for addicts and acquiring more land for the homeless to put up tents and cardboard shanties. But it turns out that that a couple of California homelessness moguls have been stealing millions from the state, using fake bank accounts to bilk the treasury out of as much as $26 million, which they allegedly used to pay off their credit card bills and buy luxury goods. The DOJ brought charges yesterday, so we’ll see what happens.
LOSER: Buc-ees No Longer No. 1
The University of Texas may have won the Red River shootout last week, but a couple of Oklahoma based convenience stores beat out Buc-ees as the nation’s top store in the latest surveys. Kwik Trip, headquartered in Wisconsin, is now the No. 1 quick shop store, while Buc-ees has toppled to the No. 5 place, a position it shares with Loves, which is headquartered in Oklahoma. Oklahoma based Quik Trip is No. 4. This relative dominance in the convenience store wars could provide some comfort to Sooner fans after the trampling they received at the hands of the Longhorns at the Cotton Bowl last weekend.
WINNERS: Hook ‘em, Gig ‘em, Wreck’em
The Longhorn victory over the Oklahoma Sooners in the Red River Shootout last Saturday put Texas back in the top 25. They are now No. 21 nationally and will take on unranked Kentucky tomorrow. Let’s be clear—for many fans, the only thing that matters is that the Longhorns beat Oklahoma and since that’s done, anything good that happens from here on out is just gravy, even if the early season was pretty rocky.
Meanwhile, Texas A&M has become a serious national contender, rising to No. 4, and Texas Tech Is also soaring up the charts, now at No. 7. The Aggies play Arkansas tomorrow afternoon, and the Red Raiders face Arizona State.
Hope your team wins! Have a great weekend.
Sherry Sylvester is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, and the former Senior Advisor to Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick.
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