In April 2024, the Iowa Legislature proposed Senate file 2435, which became effective in July of that year. The legislation prohibits the state’s public universities from directing any funds toward DEI-related offices or programs. House Study Bill 57 deals with similar DEI-related subjects, but targets the college accreditation system, while House Study Bill 53 removes defined DEI and critical race theory course material from mandatory course work. HSB 55 and 59 are designed to enforce those laws by requiring publication of all course syllabi and establishing that all finances, vendor contracts, and relevant professor information must now be made publicly available. 

On President Donald Trump’s first day in office, his cabinet directed all federal agencies to terminate any “equity-related” grants and require federal contractors to certify that they do not promote “wokeness” or DEI. Less than two weeks later, Reynolds issued a similar letter to Iowa’s state universities, calling on them to cut all DEI positions and related contracts.

Among other effects, the federal directives and governor’s order resulted in the closure of the University of Iowa’s famous International Writing Program. The Department of State declared that IWP’s grants “no longer effectuate agency priorities” nor align with “agency priorities and national interest.” The UI noted that “More than 90% of funds associated with the IWP’s federal grants are spent domestically, which would have resulted in slightly less than $1 million going back into the U.S. economy over the next year.”

These cuts and paranoid cleansing of “woke” education reached a peak in March, when the UI stated that they plan to close the Division of Access, Opportunity, and Diversity, along with many of the University’s living-learning centers and veteran/minority councils, following direction from the Iowa Board of Regents.

Also in March, the Iowa House of Representatives passed House Bill 401, which bans state universities’ general education courses from discussing “identity politics” or suggesting that systemic racism, sexism, oppression, or privilege are present in the United States or Iowa.  

The bill also mandated that general education curricula at the state’s universities include a “Western Heritage” program requirement, in which students must complete a certain amount of semester credits in course work related to the western canon to graduate. Many worry that curriculum requirements being set by the Legislature, rather than by the Board of Regents, will lead to distorted learning, particularly in history and the humanities. Citing the Legislature’s directives, the Board of Regents already has cut two UI degree programs. 

Rep. Steven Holt (R-Denison), said the bill was vital to “further enforce the principles of Western civilization and American exceptionalism.” He went on to say, “I think we left it up to the so-called experts for many years, and in my opinion, they mucked it up.”

On the same day that House File 401 passed, lawmakers also moved to approve House File 437, which establishes a “Center for Intellectual Freedom” at the UI, and voted along party lines to end caps on in-state tuition and mandatory fees. In addition, they approved a bill that would deny Iowa Tuition Grants to students who attend Iowa private colleges that have DEI programs. 

The Center for Intellectual Freedom is set up to provide courses on American history and programming on civil discourse, and is estimated to cost around $1.5 million per year. The University’s total cost from cutting its 12 employees operating its Division of Access, Opportunity, and Diversity and other DEI offices totaled just $868,219 in savings.

The day after those bills passed, Trump signed an order directing that “the Secretary of Education shall, to the maximum extent appropriate and permitted by law, take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure of the Department of Education.” Reynolds was in attendance for the order’s signing.

Republicans and right-wing think tanks like the Manhattan Institute have suggested transferring the Department of Education’s responsibilities of civil rights enforcement in public schools to the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.

However, considering the gutting of Education Department and DOJ staff earlier this year and the recent memo from the General Services Administration effectively stating that segregation is no longer an illegal practice for government contractors, it’s unlikely that any federal entity will properly enforce law and protect students. Givng civil rights-enforcement responsibilities to the DOJ is another tool for the Trump Administration to remove the Education Department’s long-held independence and centralize Trump’s authority. As of May 1, more than 250 DOJ attorneys have chosen to walk off the job instead of comply with the executive branch’s directives.

Research is also under attack. A court injunction has temporarily halted the National Institutes of Health’s cuts to Iowa research funding, which would amount to over $33 million and potentially terminate over 20,000 positions. Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley posted on X in support of the research cuts.

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With civil protections removed, institutions kneecapped, further control over education returning to the state, and Reynolds’s capture of the judicial appointment system, little stands in the way of the Iowa GOP as they expand their regulatory sights on public libraries and the private sector, threatening penalties and budget cuts for promoting critical race theory or having associations with advocacy organizations.

Along with cuts to staff and budgets, the state has become more involved in policing language and tightening restrictions on faculty and staff speech. In February the Regents made revisions to Iowa’s freedom of expression policy with more clearly defined and punitive measures for digital content it finds objectionable, and moved to scrub all UI websites of references to diversity, equity, and other “divisive” ideologies. 

In February Trump ordered federal employees to report hidden DEI coworkers or face “adverse consequences.” House Study Bill 50 will implement annual reviews by the Board of Regents of state universities’ academic programs, which critics fear are designed to enforce compliance with these new anti-DEI policies.

The chilling effect of these moves has been successful, as associating your job or personal opinions with DEI-related topics could lead to the termination of your position, office, or research grants. Many faculty have chosen to quietly avoid being targeted rather than loudly speaking up and risking the attention of Trump or the Iowa Legislature.

Asking to remain anonymous, a history teacher who works in special education in Iowa public schools observed that these cuts will predominantly be felt by children with special needs and in poor communities with already under-equipped staff and services. “Maybe they can divide people on DEI and stuff, but I hope nobody, if they knew what they were doing, would want those with disabilities to have less.” 

The Trump Administration said the arrest of students and financial cuts at Columbia University and deportation of Professor Badar Khan Suri for speech critical of the Administration will be first “of many to come” as the Administration cracks down on demonstrations against the war in Gaza. The federal District Court of the Southern District of Iowa has placed a restraining order against Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem’s department for its revoking of five UI international students’ visas.

Republicans have successfully captured key state judicial and legislative procedures and used them to strangle the institutions and legal precedents that stand to curtail their agenda and limit their power. All public and private schools in the state have signed letters of compliance with the erasure of DEI practices to protect federal and state funding. With Democrats confused and their current share of Congress too small to fight these bills, it’s unlikely anyone can stand up to Reynolds’s and Trump’s attack on education.

The post Anti-wokeness and Iowa’s dismantling of education appeared first on KRUI Radio.

Image via Amman Hassan

“More people are dying from climate policy then climate change.”

Ramaswamy cites the environmental death rate falling 985% in the last 100 years, and more Americans dying from cold temperatures. These functionalities have no relation to the question asked or statements referenced, and serve as examples of Ramaswamy’s inability to understand the topic or differentiate correlation from causation. Much of that reduction is directly caused by 20th century climate policy. The clean air act alone reduced the number of  annual premature deaths by more than 300,000 and added 1.7 years to the average American’s life expectancy. It’s a cause of improved technology in housing, safety, and weather phenomenon detection and prevention.

Vivek fails to understand the regional impact of climate change and how poorer communities cannot protect  themselves from the environment. A lot of the effects of climate change are abstract or incremental, but here are some of the definite numbers. Flooding is between 300-900% more common than it was 50 years ago. In Miami county alone, flood insurance premiums have gone up more than 300%, and will cost the city $17 billion in 2023 in flood prevention. It will cost The Bay Area more than 100 billion this decade to build levels and prevent flooding of its city, and 36% of Americans live in areas with daily air quality grades. This summer many of us Iowans experienced what that air quality can look like.

Image via Amman Hassan

“The climate change agenda has nothing to do with climate, if it did they would be supporting nuclear energy, but they are not.”

Nuclear is more than twice as expensive per watt of energy then onshore solar or wind. Iowans are clearly aware of this as the majority of our energy is sourced from wind. In fact, we generate so much energy we export roughly a third of the wind energy we produce and compensate the landowners and communities that house them. NIMBYism and community antagonism to nuclear being built in their backyard has been the primary hurdle for the construction of nuclear power plants for decades, Ramaswamy is vehemently opposed to eminent domain so it’s unclear how he would rectify this conflict.

Nuclear energy requires the mining of minerals that harms the health of those that mine them. It also produces 78 to 178 g-CO2/kWh of carbon dioxide. The process also creates nuclear waste which costs time, money and uses up plenty of land that has to be managed for more than 200,000 years. These financial and pollution arguments also forget to include future safety as meltdowns and targeted attacks of plants puts American security at risk.

“Gut the Fed and stabilize the currency by “pegging it to commodities”, like gold.”

There’s not enough gold in the world to back the US dollar. Every letter of credit or loan would instantly lose value. Your mortgage, car lease, business instant payrolls, becomes unbacked and worthless. Our economic growth would become tied to our gold supply. This limits our liquidity, restricts growth, and disincentivizes trade. Not to mention, it also allows for the antagonistic stockpiling of commodities and supplies that could harm the United States or our allies. Gold and many commodities derive their value from the same system as our modern fiat currency, trust, and belief in that it possesses value. A fractional gold standard like we had in the 20th century would still be, if not more, at risk of crises like bank runs and deflation.

The following graphs depict inflation during part of the American gold standard period, and immediately after quantitative easing during the 2008 recession. Governments and a well informed federal reserve have the primary goal of adjusting and moderating the money supply to stabilize the currency. That becomes nearly impossible if it’s tied to a commodity like gold.

Graphs via The Atlantic

“Unleash the American economy to achieve 5% GDP growth.”

The annualized GDP growth in the last 4 years has been 6.97%, and 5.2% in 2023. Annualized Job Growth in the last 4 years has been 3.59%. Unemployment is 3.4%, the lowest in over 50 years. Since Jan 2020, wages have grown nearly 20%. Inflation has dropped to 3.2% and is the lowest among the G7 and much of the developed world. Considering this data it’s unclear what Ramaswamy’s campaign means by unleashing the American economy to achieve a goal that has already been surpassed.

“There’s 13.2 million people in this state.”

After getting corrected, Ramaswamy claimed he meant voting power in reference to the Iowa caucus. However, the math doesn’t make sense. He was likely misremembering what his campaign employees had coached him on before the event.

Also, here is just a short list of some of the Ramaswamy campaign’s unfalsifiable, yet notable statements: “God is real”, “wokeism is a religion and a Title VII violation”, “English should be the sole language of the ballet”. Ramaswamy also advocated for a Russian appeasement strategy in Ukraine. He would fire 90% of federal reserve employees and abolish the Education Department, FBI, ATF, IRS, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the FDA, and the USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service. He claimed federal agents were involved in the September 11th attacks, and called the LGBT movement a “cult”.

Finally as a writer at a music centered paper, I feel as though I’m required to comment on Ramaswamy’s music taste. I can only compare this to his ideological statements in its dramatic and shallow nature.

The post Vivek Was In Iowa Again, and He Can’t Stop Lying appeared first on KRUI Radio.

*This article contains language that may not be appropriate for minors*

In this actually insane, ridiculously controversial ride of an election season, a few candidates have made themselves known more than others. On one side of the table we have the former First Lady, Hillary Clinton, who was a household name before she made her second presidential bid. Perhaps the former FL has become even more spoken of in recent months because of the unprecedented challenger to her campaign, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who has made his own name widely known.

On the other side, the notorious Donald Trump is all most people see (much to the fault of the TV news media). Trump sucks up the majority of the spotlight with the uncouth statements that he makes every few moments. Turning on the morning news often yields the same results– an update on Trump’s ravings from the last 24 hours.

Trump was up against Texas Senator Ted Cruz and the Governor of Ohio, John Kasich. His two contenders often fell into obscurity in his wake, though Cruz appeared to be a real contender for the Republican nomination. Despite his decision to drop out of the 2016 presidential race, it is important that we think about what might have been– many considered Cruz the “next best option.”

Multiple well-known figures have come out with statements recently telling America not to vote for Cruz. This includes former Speaker of the House, John Boehner, a member of Cruz’s own party. To be specific, Boehner reportedly called Ted Cruz “Lucifer in the flesh.” Boehner went on to say the following:

“I have Democrat friends and Republican friends. I get along with almost everyone, but I have never worked with a more miserable son of a bitch in my life.”

On a more humorous note, Ted Cruz’s college roommate, Craig Mazin, has also made a number of statements about Cruz via Twitter. These comments sometimes discuss Mazin’s college experience with Cruz, but also speak of Cruz’s character.

While none of these statements are explicitly about Cruz’s policies, this is where the Senator becomes more problematic. Just for clarification, here are some of Ted Cruz’s most staunch proposed policies:

In recent months, Cruz has made it very clear that he opposes all abortion– including abortions in the case of rape or incest.

Cruz has also said that if he were to become the President of the United States, he would attempt to abolish the Department of Education, along with four other major federal agencies, including the Department of Energy, the Department of Commerce, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the IRS.

On the topic of American Muslims, Cruz has said that he supports increased policing of neighborhoods with large populations of Muslim citizens. “We need to empower law enforcement to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods before they become radicalized,” Cruz has explicitly claimed. Apparently Cruz is under the misconception that the only population that can become radicalized is a Muslim population.

Ted Cruz is also a large proponent of ending the era of “political correctness,” or in other words, being a decent human being. Cruz claims that political correctness is “killing people.”

These are just a few of Cruz’s stunning policies. The list of ideological thought processes and fundamental principles gone awry goes on and on. While we now have Trump as the de facto Republican nominee and this seems entirely horrible, America just might have a dodged a Ted Cruz bullet.

And while it may seem as though Ted Cruz is effectively waging a war against himself with his undesirable social thought, the internet is waging a war that is much more fierce.

If you’re looking for a laugh, just Google “Ted Cruz Zodiac Killer.” Let the Internet tell you itself. But here is a final piece of beauty provided for you to feast your eyes on:

Shut Up and Listen is a politically-based opinion column in which you, the reader, shut up and listen to what I have to say and then formulate opinions and come to your own conclusions. 

The post Shut Up and Listen: Ted Cruz is the Zodiac Killer appeared first on KRUI Radio.