Cruz Fires Up CPAC, House Passes Anti-Feminist Bill, Failing Our Children

Gary Bauer

by Gary Bauer: Cruz Fires Up CPAC
In the past, I have told you that I am not giving up and going away. Well, neither is Senator Ted Cruz, who fired up the audience on the first day of the Conservative Political Action Conference. Speaking about the future of the Republican Party, Cruz said this:

"[The left looks] at Donald Trump and the millions of people who went to battle fighting alongside of him and they're terrified. They want him to go away. Let me tell you this right now: Donald J. Trump ain't going anywhere!"

"The Republican Party is not the party just of the country clubs. The Republican Party is the party of steelworkers and construction workers and pipeline workers and taxi cab drivers and cops and firefighters, and waiters and waitresses and the men and women with callouses on their hands who are working for this country. That is our party and these deplorables are here to stay!"

House Passes Anti-Feminist Bill As expected, the so-called "Equality Act" passed the House of Representatives yesterday. The vote was largely along party lines, with only three Republicans voting for it. But it is worth noting that not one Democrat had a problem with this anti-woman legislation.

The so-called "Equality Act" essentially legally abolishes biological sex. It effectively repeals Title IX, and guts portions of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

Is it really possible that the thousands of women who came to Washington in 2017 to march against Donald Trump think it is just and fair for their daughters to compete in athletics against boys who claim they are girls?

Is it really possible that all those women believe their daughters should be forced to share locker rooms and showers with boys who claim they are girls?

Do all those women really think women's shelters should be forced to include men who claim to be women? Do they really think women's prisons should be forced to include men who claim to be women?

Is that what they marched for? Is that why they voted for Joe Biden? Is that really modern feminism?

It's hard for me to believe that is the case. But if it isn't, where are the voices of dissent outraged over what happened on the floor of the House yesterday by a unanimous Democrat vote?

If you think I'm exaggerating the role of Democrats in pushing this radical science denial, consider this: Three female athletes in Connecticut who were tired of biological boys stealing their college dreams sued to stop the state's trans sports policy.

The Trump Administration stood with the biological girls in court. But the Biden Justice Department abandoned them and withdrew from the suit this week.

It's been said that a conservative is a liberal who got mugged. Perhaps it will soon come to be that a conservative woman is one whose progressive daughter came home and told her that she was forced to shower with a boy in the name of equality.

Meanwhile, I am pleased to report that conservative state legislators are pushing back, doing what they can to preserve some semblance of common sense in their states.

And kudos, once again, to Sen. Rand Paul, who had the courage to challenge Dr. Rachel Levine's support for the chemical castration of children. Who is Dr. Levine again? Levine is Joe Biden's nominee to be the assistant secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, and is also a man who claims to be a woman.

Failing Our Children
There's not much that liberal New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof and I would agree on. But when it comes to the issue of school closures, Kristof now gets it. His latest column highlights just how devastating the left's shutdown of our nation's public schools has been for millions of children. Here are some facts he presents:

• According to one estimate, as many as three million children in the United States have missed all formal education for almost a year.
• The San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank estimates that educational disruptions during this pandemic may increase the number of high school dropouts by nearly four percent.
• Applications for federal student loans among high school seniors have fallen 10%, a sign that some may be giving up on college.
• Fifth graders in mostly minority schools mastered only 37% of the math that usually would be expected.

And to his credit, Kristof is clear where the blame for this outrageous failure lies:

"The educational losses are disproportionately the fault of Democratic governors and mayors who too often let schools stay closed even as bars opened. The blunt fact is that it is Democrats . . . who have presided over one of the worst blows to the education of disadvantaged Americans in history. The result: more dropouts, less literacy and numeracy, widening race gaps, and long-term harm to some of our most marginalized youth."

Knowing the intolerant culture that now prevails at the Times, I hope Kristof doesn't get canceled for daring to speak the truth!

Emergency Relief Delayed?
Among the many items on the left's wish list that Democrats stuffed into the "emergency" COVID relief bill is a doubling of the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour. While it would obviously help some workers, as many as 1.4 million jobs would likely be lost as a result of this increase, which would devastate struggling small businesses right now.

Yesterday afternoon, Senate Democrats suffered a setback to their progressive dreams. The parliamentarian ruled that the minimum wage hike did not pass muster with the strict rules that govern the budget reconciliation process Democrats are using to ram through this massive $1.9 trillion bill.

Progressives aren't happy. Many are demanding that Vice President Harris overrule the parliamentarian, which she could do. But the White House is signaling that it won't "go nuclear" and break even more Senate rules.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi is digging in, however, insisting that the minimum wage hike will stay in the House bill, which is expected to pass today.

But if Senate Democrats don't overrule the parliamentarian, then two different bills will be passed, and the "emergency" relief will be delayed as the House and Senate will have to iron out their differences in a conference committee sometime later.

As we have noted in the past, this really isn't much of a COVID relief bill. Only 1% of the money is dedicated to faster vaccine distribution.

Here's another problem: Much of the money meant to help hurting Americans is going to those who haven't lost their jobs or suffered steep declines in income.

We know that because stock trading surged last year as the stimulus checks went out. There were lots of articles like this one, advising people how to invest their stimulus checks. And downloads of the popular new Robinhood stock trading app surged as the stimulus checks went out.

Yes, many people are hurting. They should be helped. But those using the stimulus money to open stock accounts are not going to bed hungry. They are not having problems making their mortgage or car payments or keeping their lights on or paying off their student loans.

But when Democrats are giving away money, they don't even bother to determine whether it is going to those who truly need it.

Hypocrisy Check

• The border facility that Joe Biden has been forced to reopen to accommodate the growing number of children crossing the border is the same facility that Kamala Harris vowed to close if she made it to the White House.
• After multiple attacks by Iranian-backed militias in recent days, Joe Biden authorized the dropping of a few bombs in Syria. When Donald Trump did the same thing in 2017, Biden Press Secretary Jen Psaki tweeted, "Also what is the legal authority for strikes? Assad is a brutal dictator. But Syria is a sovereign country."
• Governor Andrew Cuomo and his henchmen continue to do everything they can to ruin the woman who has accused him of sexual harassment. In the middle of the Kavanaugh confirmation controversy when he was wrongly accused of sexual assault, Cuomo demanded that Judge Kavanaugh take a lie detector test. Now the governor is refusing to say whether he will follow his own advice.

As the saying goes, if the left didn't have double standards it wouldn't have any standards at all!
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Gary Bauer (@GaryLBauer)  is a conservative family values advocate and serves as president of American Values and chairman of the Campaign for Working Families

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