Opportunity fleeing the coasts, from censorship to forced speech and other commentary

Jobs beat: Opportunity Fleeing the Coasts

“People — and, more recently, capital — migrate to places that offer greater opportunities,” explains Spiked’s Joel Kotkin. In the United States now, “even industries once thought best suited to coastal economies, notably finance and technology, have begun to disperse.” Thus, New York City’s “share of finance jobs has fallen,” with Dallas and Miami gaining. “A similar pattern is evident in the high-tech sector” as Texas, not California, leads “the nation in new tech jobs,” followed by Florida, Georgia, Tennessee and North Carolina. “Foreign immigrants,” “blue-collar workers” and “younger, largely educated workers are also on the move.” The rise and embrace of new centers of commerce “remains the most effective way to invigorate economies and stimulate innovation.”

Legal take: From Censorship to Forced Speech

“In Washington state, many have developed what seems a certain appetite” not just for censorship but for “compelled speech,” laments Jonathan Turley at The Hill. Democrats there recently pushed through legislation to compel “clerics to rat out congregants who confessed” to certain crimes. Plus, the University of Washington “has been fighting to punish professors who refuse to conform to its own orthodox values” — as when one wrote his own satirical “land acknowledgement.”. “The Framers would have been appalled by efforts to compel speech,” especially as they saw “the greatest danger” coming “not from a tyrant but the tyranny of the majority.” Indeed, it’s nothing short of “democratic despotism” when “the majority brushes aside disfavored views and values as ‘toxic’ or ‘harmful.’ ”

Conservative: Shapiro’s Problem With Nuns

Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-Pa.) “tries to pose as a moderate Democrat” yet still harasses the Little Sisters of the Poor, an order of nuns that keep having to sue to protect a “religious and conscience exemption” from having to pay for “contraception and sterilization coverage,” notes the Washington Examiner’s editorial board. Shapiro “wants to force the tiny share of employers with religious objections into being contraceptive and abortion pill providers,” even after that cause “lost to the Sisters in the Supreme Court in a 7-2 ruling.” If Shapiro truly aims to “appeal across party lines and ideological gulfs,” he “should lead the way on a culture-war truce.” This would “anger Planned Parenthood,” but he ought to “stand up to special interests, and stand up for religious minorities.”

From the left: Jeffries’ Trading-Ban Sabotage

It seems “wholly confirmed now” that House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries is undermining the drive to pass the “exceedingly popular policy of ending congressional stock trading” in Congress, fumes The American Prospect’s David Dayen. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna’s petition to force a floor vote on a stock-trading ban “has 74 signatures, including 15 Republicans, more than enough for a House majority if all Democrats sign on.” But “Jeffries’s team is, in fact, discouraging members from signing the Luna petition,” instead “pitching their [own] bill,” which “extends the stock trading ban to President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance.” This kills the chance to ban congressional trading, as “no Republican will ever sign on to that,” so “both competing discharge petitions will fail.” It’s “cynicism winning out.”

Health watch: Pot’s Not Good for Anyone

President Trump’s order to “recategorize how the federal government views marijuana” will bring “huge financial benefit to the businesses seeking to profit from making pot more mainstream” but “won’t make America’s citizens healthier or her cities more livable,” grumbles Patrick T. Brown at City Journal. The move will put pot “on the same level” as “codeine, ketamine, anabolic steroids, and other drugs considered to pose a moderate-to-low risk of dependence and to have an accepted medical use.” Yet: “In reality, the purported medical benefits of marijuana are limited, while the personal and public health costs of increasingly prevalent and potent pot continue to rise.” Whatever the “financial upside from making every American city look like Amsterdam,” the “social costs” would “far outweigh” those benefits.

— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board