Going After China: Show Notes, 10/24/22
Also up for today, the national report card and some bad news for Democrats.
The Joe Cunningham Show airs 3-4 p.m. every weekday on NewsTalk 96.5 KPEL. The daily show notes offer you a look into the topics of the day and the links to the top stories and Joe's own writings on the state of politics in Louisiana and around the country. Follow Joe on Twitter at @JoePCunningham and Like the Joe Cunningham Show on Facebook. You can also subscribe to the Joe Cunningham Show podcast on Apple, Spotify, Stitcher, or Amazon.
Garland Takes On China
At a pretty significant press conference today, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland announced that the FBI and intelligence agencies had been working to stop actors with the People’s Republic of China from derailing a case against a Chinese telecom company (Huawei), attempting to recruit law enforcement to work for the Chinese government, and harassing and threatening a Chinese-American citizen to relocate to China.
There are also rumors that the social media app TikTok may be tied to the government’s counter-operations. The talk was amplified by an explosive report from Forbes showing the depth of tracking and information-gathering software embedded in the social media app. According to Forbes, a "China-based team at TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, planned to use the TikTok app to monitor the personal location of some specific American citizens."
But the material reviewed by Forbes indicates that ByteDance's Internal Audit team was planning to use this location information to surveil individual American citizens, not to target ads or any of these other purposes. Forbes is not disclosing the nature and purpose of the planned surveillance referenced in the materials in order to protect sources. TikTok and ByteDance did not answer questions about whether Internal Audit has specifically targeted any members of the U.S. government, activists, public figures or journalists.
This is a good thing, regardless of how you feel about the Biden administration, the Department of Justice, and the FBI. The Chinese Communist Party has been working to surveil and gather intelligence on American citizens for a long time, and this is a big step in taking them on.
Bad Grades
This, via the Wall Street Journal, is an absolute failure of the U.S. education system and the policies that were put in place during the pandemic.
Overall, scores in math and reading for both fourth- and eighth-grade students have fallen sharply since 2019, the last time the assessments were given, according to the collection of results from 50 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. Department of Defense Education Activity schools. A separate analysis of 26 large-city school districts also showed declines.
Average math scores for eighth-graders in 2022 dropped to 274 out of a possible 500, falling 8 points from 2019. Reading scores declined 3 points, to 260.
No state or jurisdiction posted gains in math in either grade, nor did any of the 26 large districts included in the analysis. Utah was the only state where the drop in the eighth-grade math score wasn’t statistically significant. Nationwide, 38% of eighth-graders tested below basic achievement levels in math. The basic level denotes partial mastery.
Louisiana, thankfully, had some bright spots, and I think Lafayette and Vermilion Parishes in particular helped carry the state.
Some Doomsday Scenarios For The Midterms
In Michigan, Trafalgar has Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer in a tie against her GOP opponent, Tudor Dixon. In New York, DCCC Chair and U.S. Representative Sean Patrick Maloney is getting an infusion of cash from the party, signaling he is also in trouble. These two bits of data further play into the idea that there is a wave coming, and at this point it may just be tsunami-level.
Headlines Of The Day
Ted Cruz Schools 'The View' During Visit in Epic Exchange (RedState)
Scoop: Tucker Carlson lashes out at GOP campaign chief in irate private call (Axios)
Florida's Hispanic voters back DeSantis over Crist, support Martha's Vineyard migrant flights (NBC News)
Abrams’ campaign chair collected millions in legal fees from voting rights organization (POLITICO)
Female High-School Volleyball Athlete Suffers Serious Head Injury after Transgender Player Spikes ‘Abnormally Fast’ Ball (National Review)