Signs and Wonders 03.02

Big day for Romney. First of all, let's admit that Tuesday was a good day for Mitt Romney, with a strong win in Arizona and a close victory in Michigan. But it's important to note that Romney has only 168 delegates. His opponents combined total 139 so far. Nevada is the only state Romney has won with a clear majority of the popular vote, and that state is a special case: 25 percent of Republican caucus goers were Mormon, and they voted for Romney at a rate above 90 percent. Make no mistake; Romney remains the favorite to win the nomination. Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich are not even on the ballot in Virginia, and Romney is well organized and well funded in the "winner take all" states that have their primaries in April and beyond. But we are starting to hear more talk of a brokered GOP convention, and that would have been "crazy-talk" just eight weeks ago.

Not so family-friendly. Education choice advocates cried foul in early February when the Obama administration revealed its proposed budget for fiscal year 2013 - one that cancels all federal funding for a popular school choice program in the District of Columbia. The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program has, since 2003, given low-income children in the District the opportunity to escape the failing public schools to which they've been assigned by ZIP code and instead attend the private school of their parents' choice. The nation's first federally funded school choice program, it boasts a 91 percent high school graduation rate, compared to only 70 percent citywide among children with similar backgrounds. The budget also eliminated abstinence education funding nationwide.

The high cost of gasoline. I've been to Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Nashville in the past two weeks, and I paid more than $4 per gallon for gas in Los Angeles. The nationwide average is now more than $3.60 a gallon, and that's up 25 cents since Jan. 1. Experts say that prices could reach a record $4.25 a gallon by late April. Economists say a 25-cent jump in gasoline prices, if sustained over a year, would cost the economy about $35 billion. That's only 0.2 percent of the total U.S. economy, but economists say it's a meaningful amount, especially at a time when growth is only so-so.

Remembrances. A couple of interesting and instructive events took place on this week in history. On Feb. 26, 380, Emperor Theodosius I, with co-emperors Gratian and Vanentinian II, issued the Edict of Thessalonica, which declared their wish that all Roman citizens convert to Christianity. On Feb. 25, 1570, Pope Pius V excommunicated Queen Elizabeth I of England. The event is considered significant in the establishment of the Church of England. Also on Feb. 25, in 1919, Oregon instituted a one-cent tax on gasoline, becoming the first state in the nation to do so. On Feb. 26, 1802, Victor Hugo was born. Hugo wrote, in his masterwork Les Miserables, a line that pretty well describes the modern world: "God is behind everything, but everything hides God."