Editorials

Coming to terms with the poor performance of Nevada’s school system has been an education for policymakers, elected officials, business leaders and taxpayers alike. Although the state’s ultimate measures of success — high school graduation rates and the value of high school diplomas — rate among the nation’s worst overall, Nevada has many excellent schools with excellent teachers, leaders and education models.

If it weren’t already obvious that Nevada taxpayers and their elected stewards are powerless to rein in growing public employee compensation costs — far and away the largest expense of local government — an arbitrator ended all doubt last week.

Lawmakers put the pedal to the metal last week in passing a $1.3 billion tax incentive package for Tesla Motors, incentives that will speed the construction of a massive battery plant east of Reno. Calls for legislators — even those by legislators — to slow down were ignored.

The push for a publicly financed downtown soccer stadium will continue because Las Vegas Councilwoman Lois Tarkanian decided she needed at least another month to scrutinize the project — a $200 million proposal that will have the city pay about three-quarters of the venue’s upfront costs.

The New York Times is hardly a defender of the oil and gas industries. The newspaper is more likely to rip fossil fuels, sound the climate change alarm and sing the praises of heavily subsidized — and hugely expensive — green energy technologies. So the editors of the Gray Lady had to swallow hard this week when they published a bit of undeniable reality: fracking is saving the economy.

Thousands of Nevada families are done waiting for the turnaround of the state’s public schools. And thousands more would bolt their neighborhood schools if they had the chance.

President Barack Obama wants what’s best for us — regardless of what the American people have to say about it or whether his idea of what’s best for us really is the best thing for us or not.

They came here first. They came here again and again. And we might never know why.

Building a new medical school at UNLV won’t be enough to improve Southern Nevada’s health care system. The valley’s acute physician shortage is a result of several factors, foremost among them a lack of residency programs and positions. Medical school graduates are more likely to practice where they complete their resident training.

Across the developed world, the freedom of movement is considered an absolute human right. That freedom includes not only the ability to move within a country, but the right to leave a country without punishment.