Bill Pearson Visits Harvard

Today I was lucky enough to attend a lecture given by Bill Pearson at Harvard. Pearson, a notable figure in the world of outsourcing and offshoaring, explained what exactly the economic ramifications if offshoaring are.
The United States has, especially since the dawn of the internet, outsourced work to foreign countries. South Korea and Singapore--two of the first major outsourcing nations--have developed economies that rival the first world, despite having been among the poorest nations several decades ago. Today China, India, and Pakistan are the major centers of outsourcing. Now, we in the West hear quiet a bit of complaining. Liberals will tell you (despite the Toyotas in their driveways) that Americans are suffering because of cheap Asian imports. A liberal will probably also tell you (despite the clothing he is wearing that was produced in China) that buying imports from Asia is usually immoral because they pay workers almost nothing! Of course, this liberal will forget that the only reason we in the West can pay high wages is because just a few generations ago we had Lowel Mills and other cheap labor sites.
Don't get me wrong--plenty of conservatives believe a serious problem exists because of these cheap Asian imports, especially in the automobile industry. I for one would prefer to drive an American car. Michael Savage has commented on several occasions that foreign automobile companies are hurting the United States. But are they really? Yes, Ford and GM are suffering. But is it fair to blame that on Asia? The quality of American cars really was below that of Japanese cars a couple decades ago. Today the difference in negligible. Perhaps that's why Ford and GM are starting to do better.
Why did American automobile companies have sub-par products? Well, maybe because, despite the American tendency to idolize capitalism, the low amount of competition meant they didn't really need to produce the best cars. Once competition from Japan came, American automobile companies had to adjust. That's why capitalism works. If a company is not giving the consumer what he wants, the consumer will find someone else to go. In the case of Ford and GM, that happened to be Japan.

Romney Leading Iowa

The Washington Post featured this and this today on the front page of its website. Romney is leading the race for the Republican nomination right now--at least in Iowa. Winning the first few primaries is quiet important to winning the nomination.

So why is Romney leading? Well, probably because his campaign has been a local one. Romney has chosen specific states to target specifically, while still attempting to appear on the nation-wide level as well. McCain has made a bit of an effort to run a similar campaign, but the other main candidates--Thompson, McCain, and Guiliani--have been running by criss-crossing the nation or trying to get spots of national news shows.

What I don't get: where is Duncan Hunter. Duncan Hunter, endorsed by Ann Coulter as the strongest conservative candidate, has views that fit the Reagan model every Republican is looking for. So why isn't he doing better? Well, he's had a hard time making a lot of noise. Fred Thompson hasn't entered the race and has already entered the "major candidate" bracket.

Personally, I'd like to see Hunter as president. Will it happen? Maybe. Ann Coulter could, if Hunter wanted, spend quiet a bit of time talking about him. Whether or not liberals like it, Coulter is viewed positively by many conservatives. Some, like the guy who writes this blog, idolize Coulter. Liberals say she's too mean. Some conservatives fear that an actively endorsing Coulter would hurt a candidate. Not true! Liberals hate Ann. They simply despise her. Why? Well, she doesn't agree with them--apparently freedom of speech only exists if you are speaking about the injustices faced by whatever minority group you want to associate yourself with.

Coulter appears constantly. Whether it is on tour for her book, speaking at colleges, or just making an appearance on T.V., she reaches a wider audience than any other political commentator in the United States. A Coulter buzz around Hunter could bring him to the national screen--or at least help him win a few states.

Just for the record, I doubt Hunter will win. But I would be lying if I told you I didn't want to see it happen. I love Thompson and think he has the ability to give the strong, Reaganesque conservative image that Republicans want. Hunter would make an excellent vice presidential running mate.

The Beginning

Welcome to my blog, Washington Wes. As a rising high school senior in the D.C. area, you will probably be surprised to find that, unlike the majority of D.C. suburbanites--who generally live in large homes, hold a degree from a good school, have a high-paying job, and live unusually pleasant lives--I am a conservative. Why? Well, unlike many of my peers at school, both of my parents came from poor areas--my father grew up in a housing project, my mother in a small town where few people had received a good education and the idea of a woman going to college was so appalling that her family rarely spoke to her for years. Despite this disadvantage, both of my parents have become successful.

I don't live in the wealthy area around D.C. If you go farther out, homes are less expensive and smaller--still nice, but most would rather live in the wealthier areas. Why? Well, my family could certainly afford a home in Potomac or Bethesda (the two premier areas on the Maryland side of D.C.), but instead decided that I should have something they never did: a strong education. This brings me to my first political view that I will post here.

Now, Montgomery County is supposed to have some of the best public schools in the nation. The parents are involved, SAT scores are high. So why not just go to a public school?

For starters, they are all overcrowded. Churchill High School, Maryland's top public school, has SAT scores only slightly below those of many private schools. Since my parents could afford a home in the Churchill district, why not live there instead of paying for tuition? Simple. The freshman class at Churchill is roughly 800 students. Class sizes are high, especially honors and AP courses, which can often reach 35 or 40. The other option is one of the D.C. area's many elite private schools: Maret, Landon, Georgetown Prep, Stone Ridge, Bullis, St. Andrew's, and the list goes on. These schools all have a freshman class of roughly 100 students, yet still offer nearly all the same AP courses. The average class size? Usually somewhere around 16. The largest class I've encountered at my school was 19 students. That same year, I had a classes with 7, 9, or 10 students.

Some, like Ann Coulter, who recently posted on her website:

Not class size, not preschool, not even vouchers, though vouchers would obviously improve the education of all students. You could have lunatics running the schools — and often do — and if the kids live with married parents, they will end up at good colleges and will lead happy, productive lives 99 percent of the time.

While I agree that class size is not the most important factor, it certainly makes a difference. But still, that is not the only advantage of a private school. While Churchill's average SAT score rivals many private schools, Churchill has fewer students go to the Ivy League, MIT, Stanford, Duke, and WashU than nearly all private schools. Why? Well, for starters, good public schools usually share a few common characteristics. The grades are inflated--Dartmouth has openly said that they find private high school grades a far better indicator of future performance that public school grades. Teacher quality, despite higher pay, is generally much lower. The high SAT scores are derived from the school's rich parents who can pay the money for SAT tutoring.

Why couldn't Hillary Clinton have admitted that on the YouTube debates? Democrats love telling us Americans that the public schools are failing children--and in many cases they are. What they don't like to do is admit that the teacher's unions get in the way of actually having good teachers at schools. They send their kids to "elite" private schools (Sidwell Friends, where Chelsea Clinton attended, while generally considered an elite school, is also known for having wild rainbow parties, dances where the school allows drinking, and students who physically harm other students simply because they are conservative), but make up excuses. Hillary could have simply said that the D.C. public schools are among the nation's worst. As a white girl, she probably would have been miserable--being at a school filled with black thugs from the D.C. ghetto would make any sane person miserable. She could have said that Chelsea had high hopes of going to one of the nation's elite colleges, all of which accept a disproportionately large number if kids from private schools. Instead, she blamed it on the press. Typical.