I like to monitor all the best governors, just in case I decide to switch states. Obviously, DeSantis is up there, but what about Texas governor Greg Abbott? He likes to fight, too. And he’s willing to make Democrats miserable in order to get what he wants.

Here’s a story from The Federalist:

Historically, Texas has painfully lagged in school choice programs, resembling more of a blue state than its Republican trifecta. Currently, the only avenues of school choice in Texas are within the public system: charter schools and magnet schools, as well as inter-district and intra-district enrollment avenues. School choice programs that allow students to move outside the public education system are nonexistent.

But Abbott has committed to changing that. He’s calling for universal education savings accounts (ESAs), which would grant K-12 students statewide access to taxpayer funding for other selected educational avenues.

The Texas Legislature returned to Austin for a third special session on Oct. 9. Abbott made it clear that it is time for Texas to pass school choice. If legislators cannot get it passed this session, then he’ll bring them back immediately for another session. “I can play this game longer than they can play this game,” he said about the legislature.

A lot of Republicans actually are very leftist on education issues. They don’t want parents having more control. They think that government knows best about what children should learn.

Look:

Republicans who represent rural areas in the House of Representatives blocked school choice from passing in the spring legislative session.

Kim Reynolds is also doing a great  job as governor of Iowa, and Abbott is stealing her ideas:

Abbott is also prepared to utilize an effective approach that Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds employed in 2022. When Republican legislators opposed school choice in her state, she worked to get them voted out of office. The tactic is well-timed with Texas primary elections next spring.

This is what Texas conservatives are trying to pass:

Texas state Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, introduced Senate Bill 1, named the Texas Education Freedom Act, on Oct. 9, the day the session kicked off. The bill passed through the committee on Oct. 13 with a vote of 18-13. It has now moved to the Texas House.

The bill, if the state house passes it, would establish an education savings account program in Texas. Families would receive $8,000 per student in taxpayer funds that they could use on various educational expenses, including accredited private school tuition, textbooks, tutoring, transportation, and educational therapies.

School choice is really important for Christians. We need to have the ability to put our money into schools that work for us. What we don’t want is to pay our money first, then hope for the best. It’s amazing to me how many Christians trust a secular government to provide them with health care, education, etc. after they pay up front. Keep your money in your pocket until you find something that works for you!

When I was in college studying computer science, there was a new idea going around called “design patterns”. Basically, this was a cookbook of component arrangements that were “best practices” for solving certain problems. Depending on your problem, you might try different patterns, like Observer, Visitor, Strategy, etc. And it turns out that there are design patterns for social issues, too.

Here’s a new report from the Institute for Family Studies:

Fifty to 65% of Americans believe that living together before marriage will improve their odds of relationship success. Younger Americans are especially likely to believe in the beneficial effects of cohabitation, and to view living together as providing a valuable test of a relationship ahead of marriage. Yet living together before marriage has long been associated with a higher risk for divorce, contradicting the common belief that cohabitation will improve the odds of a marriage lasting.

[…]Using a new national sample of Americans who married for the first time in the years 2010 to 2019, we examined the stability of these marriages as of 2022 based on whether or not, and when, people had lived together prior to marriage. Consistent with prior research, couples who cohabited before marriage were more likely to see their marriages end than those who did not cohabit before marriage.

Key findings:

•  34% of marriages ended among those who cohabited before being engaged, compared to 23% of marriages for those who lived together only after being either married or engaged to be married.

And this from the key takeaways was interesting:

• Reasons for moving in together also matter: People who reported that their top reason for moving in together was either to test the relationship or because it made sense financially were more likely to see their marriages end than those who did so because they wanted to spend more time with their partner.
• Having a greater number of prior cohabiting partners is associated with a higher likelihood of marriages ending.

I think the key point in these studies is that couples who decide to commit are moving in very different reasons than couples who just slide into cohabitation because it’s convenient.

It’s interesting because it shows that being cautious about commitment is more likely to cause instability. The attitude seems to be “I’ll keep doing this as long as it makes me happy”.

With commitment, the attitude is going to be more like “let’s decide to unite, and then it will be on us to make it work”. The old marriage vows were all about that commitment. I really have to wonder whether people mean it when they say those words today, they are so counter to our hedonistic culture.

I think what people should be looking for is a mate who thinks that the relationship works better if both people work at it. If you have one person who thinks that it is the other person’s job to make them happy, run from that relationship. Like, if you are always doing little things to help the other person do well in their tasks and purposes, and they never do anything to help you, then that’s a bad sign. You don’t want to commit to someone who thinks that relationships should be effortless, that they don’t have to do anything to put gas in your fuel tank in order to make you perform.

Ideally, you want someone who thinks that it’s fun to put fuel in your tank, and thinks that it’s their job to do that for you. Just because they like to see your engine run.