Human Interest

        In reference to efforts to teach black children, the president of the St. Petersburg, Florida, chapter of the NAACP, Maria Scruggs, said: "The (school) district has shown they just can't do it. ... Now it's time for the community to step in." That's a recognition that politicians and the education establishment, after decades of promises, cannot do much to narrow the huge educational achievement gap between Asians and whites on the one hand and blacks on the other.

The White House has completed negotiations on the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, a modernized version of NAFTA, the 24-year-old free trade agreement that has transformed the American economy.

USMCA updates NAFTA framework for the 21st Century, installing new rules for digital trade, intellectual property, and other crucial areas of the continental economy. USMCA is also an exercise in restraint; it doesn't touch parts of NAFTA that are working -- especially trade provisions powering America's energy renaissance.