Think Tank West

Depending on where you live, you might have seen a story in your local paper on a new report finding that test scores have improved under the No Child Left Behind Act, implying — but not outright saying — that NCLB is working. So why would getting this news depend on where you live? Because [...]

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Since the new FISA bill was announced last week, Democratic leaders have been desperately trying to spin the legislation as a hard-won compromise rather than a capitulation. Time has an article on the FISA bill that’s a classic of the genre: A compromise deal to extend the federal government’s domestic spying powers, passed by the [...]

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Over at Ars Technica, I cover Sen. Chris Dodd’s plans to filibuster the FISA bill that is now under consideration in the Senate. Given that the Senate already overrode Dodd’s filibuster and passed legislation that undermines civil liberties back in February, his effort this time is a long shot. But he’s giving it all he’s [...]

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The state of Florida announced yesterday that it will pay $1.75 billion to buy out the nation’s largest sugar producer and 300 square miles of land it owns north of the environmentally sensitive Florida Everglades. Although most news stories ignored the connection, the deal is yet another cost Americans continue to pay for our misguided [...]

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Jeffrey Goldberg looks in Matt Yglesias’ and my direction and declares that “it’s an odd phenomenon” that people care about the fact that Goldberg and James Kirchick are making false claims about what the president of Iran said. False claims that are leading people in the United States to want to go to war with [...]

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The public school advocacy group Center on Education Policy released a new report today, titled “Has Student Achievement Increased Since 2002?” Its answer is “yes,” based on relatively worthless high-stakes state-level testing data and on the more esteemed National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). For reasons known only to the report’s authors, they make no use of the [...]

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A month ago, I wrote here and in a TechKnowledge article about the telling imagery that a company called L-1 Identity Solutions had used in some promotional materials. The cover of their REAL ID brochure featured an attractive woman’s face with her driver license data superimposed over it, along with her name, address, height, eye [...]

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We’re now learning the meaning of a new policy that Americans can’t “willfully” refuse to show ID at airports. The Consumerist has a write-up of one man’s experience with IDless travel. It turns out they do a background check on you using, among other things, your political affiliation. That’s a nice window onto what identity-based [...]

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One of the oft-encountered talking points offered by the Left is the extent to which the Bush administration has alternatively ignored, intimidated, and done violence to the scientific community. The picture being painted is that of a know-nothing Christian fundamentalist in the thrall of corporate America waging unremitting war against the Enlightenment. While there is [...]

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The Washington rumor mill has Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty as the leading candidate to be John McCain’s running mate. If so, that would be a clear slap in the face to small-government conservatives. Pawlenty, who reportedly coined the term “Sam’s Club conservative” to describe his political philosophy, has been an economic populist and big-spender generally. [...]

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