Amber Duke

Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin is not backing down in the face of left-wing criticism of his new policy on parental rights in schools. During a Sunday interview on CNN's State of the Union, Youngkin rejected the push from teachers' unions and Democratic activists to supplant families as the most important arbiter of a child's upbringing. "[P]arents have a fundamental right to be engaged in their children’s lives,” Youngkin said. “And, oh, by the way, children have a right to have parents engaged in their life. And we needed to fix a wrong…children don’t belong to the state. They belong to families.

Cheating scandals in sports are, sadly, not uncommon. Tom Brady was suspended for several games after the NFL claimed he was "generally aware" of a plot to deflate footballs to make them easier to throw. The Houston Astros fired their manager for using video footage to steal opponents' signs. Barry Bonds missed out on a spot in the baseball Hall of Fame over his use of performance enhancing drugs. Cyclist Lance Armstrong was stripped of his seven consecutive Tour de France titles and an Olympic medal for doping. Still, it's fairly unusual for cheating to make national headlines unless it occurs outside of one of the four major professional sporting leagues. That's why it caught my attention when there were three major cheating scandals involving niche sports in just one month.

Maroon 5 frontman Adam Levine was accused last week of engaging in an extramarital affair and sending inappropriate messages to multiple other women. This was probably not a surprise to anyone who watched the Super Bowl LIII halftime show; Levine's taste in tattoos tells you pretty much everything you need to know. Even being a Victoria's Secret model, like his wife Behati Prinsloo, cannot save you from the depravity of a man who got "California" permanently inked across his torso. The first allegation against Levine came from Sumner Stroh, an Instagram model (yes, that's a real profession now). Stroh shared screenshots of messages in which Levine drools over how "hot" she is and cops to meeting her in person.

Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin has delivered a major win for the school board parents who helped propel him to victory in 2021. Starting in October, the state's public schools will be required to adhere to a new policy regarding transgender students. The updated guidance, first reported by the Daily Wire, is rooted in truth, parental rights, and plain ol' common sense. Transgender students are now only allowed to change their names on official documents with permission from their parents. Students must also demonstrate a "persistent and sincere belief" that they identify as a different gender. "Overnight travel accommodations, locker rooms and other intimate spaces used for school-related activities and events shall be based on sex,” the policy also says.

All signs point to the BYU-Duke volleyball incident being just another hate crime hoax. Add it to the list with Jussie Smollett's run-in with MAGA hat-wearing, bleach-pouring racists outside a Chicago subway, Bubba Wallace's terrifying encounter with a noose in a NASCAR garage, or a Colorado Rockies fan's injudicious shouting of a racial slur at a black batter. Duke University volleyball player Rachel Richardson claimed after a match against Brigham Young University two weeks ago that a member of the BYU student section was repeatedly calling her the N-word while she was serving. The only problem? There's no evidence it ever happened. BYU provided an update on its investigation into the incident on Friday.

Carnegie Mellon University told The Spectator they "do not condone" tweets from one of their professors that wished Queen Elizabeth II an agonizing death. Uju Anya, who teaches in the Department of Modern Languages, referred to Queen Elizabeth as the "chief monarch of a thieving raping genocidal empire" and said she hoped her dying moments would be "excruciating". Twitter later removed the tweet for violating its terms of service. [caption id="attachment_39734" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Uju Anya Twitter Screenshot[/caption] "I'm not wishing her dead. She's dying already," Anya said in another tweet. "I'm wishing her an agonizingly painful death like the one she caused for millions of people.

Duke University volleyball player Rachel Richardson claimed that she was the target of racial slurs during a match against Brigham Young University this past weekend — but her story seems to have less evidence than the rape allegations once leveled against members of her school's lacrosse team. It was actually Lesa Pamplin, Richardson's godmother, who first made the accusation on Twitter. She claimed that Richardson was called the N-word "every time she served. She was threatened by a white male that told her to watch her back going to the team bus. A police officer had to be put by their bench." Richardson later confirmed the alleged incident in her own Twitter statement.

In light of President Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan, conservatives have revamped their rallying cry that college is a scam and no one should go. In a lot of ways, college is a scam. It is certainly too expensive. Oftentimes, students spend more time awash in woke politics than learning important life and career skills. However, it’s reductionist and not very helpful to tell young people that college isn’t ever worth their time. The oft-cited alternative to college is trade school. Conservatives correctly point out that plumbers, electricians, and similar tradesmen can earn just as much as some college graduates. Their training, meanwhile, is a fraction of the cost of a bachelor's degree. However, we need to be careful about glamorizing manual labor.

Hollywood star Chris Pratt is having an incredible few months. Pratt's new show The Terminal List is the top streamed television series on Amazon Prime, the latest Jurassic World movie just surpassed $900 million at the box office and filming recently wrapped on the third and final installment of Guardians of the Galaxy. His wife, Katherine Schwarzenegger, just welcomed the couple's second baby, and next year, Pratt will provide the voice for popular animated characters Mario and Garfield in their respective movies. Pratt's rise is especially remarkable because less than two years ago the online mob officially deigned him "The Worst Chris" after a series of media attacks about his alleged political and religious views.