Not all kids are A+ students, Bragg vs. rule of law and other commentary

From the left: Not All Kids Are A+ Students

“Optimism bias” says “every student is capable of academic flourishing” and failure to flourish reveals “error or injustice,” fumes Freddie deBoer at Substack. But “overwhelming empirical evidence shows that students sort themselves” by academic ability “early in life, with remarkable consistency.” Why? Because “there is such a thing as individual academic potential.” This bias “makes the enthusiasm for particular interventions immune to evidence,” such as pre-K (which “doesn’t work” to solve “racial and socioeconomic achievement gaps”) and school funding — “we’ve been shoveling money at the racial achievement gap for 40 years, to no avail.” To be clear: “I believe that we can change large group disparities in education (such as the racial achievement gap) by addressing major socioeconomic inequalities,” but “even after we eliminate racial or gender gaps, there will be wide differences between individual students, regardless of pedagogy or policy.”

Gadfly: Biden’s Empty ‘Red Line’ for China

Team Biden a month ago “warned China that shipping ‘lethal support’ or weapons to Russia would constitute stepping over a ‘red line,’ ” yet in recent weeks “evidence has added up that China has been shipping Russia rifles, drone parts, and perhaps ammunition,” observes National Review’s Jim Geraghty. Oops: “If the Biden administration acknowledges the crossing of a red line, it will have to enforce consequences, and those consequences could mean escalation of a proxy war that already has Russian fighters taking down U.S. surveillance drones.” So expect “no consequences. Red lines are a lot easier to draw than to enforce.”

Elex watch: Minority GOP Voters Boost Trump

Ex-President Donald Trump’s “average double-digit advantage over Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis” may be “because of his clear edge among potential Republican primary voters of color,” notes CNN’s Harry Enten. It’s 2:1 among those voters, but tied among GOP whites. Yet these voters are “becoming a larger part of the party” — up nearly 5% since 2016. Trump’s gain with them occurs “even as his margin among White voters has declined,” but also while “the Republican Party as a whole has been improving among voters of color.” If minority voters continue their shift to the GOP and Trump, “they could provide them both with a big boost.”

Libertarian: Bragg vs. Rule of Law

Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s “dubious” case against ex-President Donald Trump “undermines the rule of law in the name of upholding it,” contends Reason’s Jacob Sullum. The key: Was the $130,000 in hush money paid via Trump lawyer Michael Cohen to porn star Stormy Daniels a campaign donation? “Cohen accepted that characterization in 2018, when he pleaded guilty to violating “federal limits on campaign contributions.” But “in the five years since . . . the Justice Department has conspicuously declined to charge Trump.” And the Federal Election Commission in 2021 “declined to pursue charges against Trump, his business, or his campaign.” Plus, “prosecutors working for Bragg’s predecessor, Cyrus R. Vance Jr.,” also declined. “Why pursue a case based on debatable facts and an untested legal theory that looks like a politically motivated attempt to ‘get’ Trump?”

Economists: Dodd-Frank’s Bank Failure

The Dodd-Frank Act aimed to make the banking system less risky after the 2008-2009 financial crisis, but has “had the opposite effect,” argue Michael Faulkender & Tyler Goodspeed at The Wall Street Journal. Why? The law’s stress-testing “led banks to diversify in the same way, which elevated systemic risk even as individual banks became less risky.” Now, “if something brings down one major bank, others are more likely to fall, snowballing into a major financial system collapse.” Meanwhile, the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank shows “regulators can’t anticipate all risk,” such as rapidly rising interest rates that crash banks’ bond holdings, and “government’s inevitable errors will reach across the financial system.” Solution: Scrap Dodd-Frank’s “micromanagement of banks and simply require greater capital levels.”

— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board