Featured Commentary category, Page 58
Elizabeth Kryder-Reid: The importance of shining a light on hidden toxic histories
Indianapolis proudly claims Elvis’ last concert, Robert Kennedy’s speech in response to Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination, and the Indianapolis 500. There’s a 9/11 memorial, a Medal of Honor Memorial and a statue of former NFL quarterback Peyton Manning. What few locals know, let alone tourists, is that the city...
Nathan Benefield: Pennsylvanians deserve truth on education spending
Pennsylvania’s Basic Education Funding Commission has begun holding hearings on how to remake the state’s public schools funding formula after a state court determined that the existing formula violates the state constitution. To make informed decisions, the commission, lawmakers, parents and voters need accurate information. Unfortunately, misinformation about public education...
Elwood Watson: The puppet of the House
Get your popcorn ready, because a gut-wrenching level of drama has gripped the House of Representatives! To quote Democratic minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, “The Republican Party is currently in a civil war.” Last week, Speaker Kevin McCarthy slid over to a lectern and called for an impeachment inquiry into President...
Cal Thomas: Sex and the city, political edition
The Republican Party, the party that for years has styled itself as the party of “family values” and “traditional marriage” has lost all credibility on these issues. Not only do polls show a huge majority of Republicans supporting the thrice-married, serial adulterer Donald Trump, but now three Republican women have...
Commentary: How are Russians overall reacting to the war in Ukraine? With indifference.
“The special military operation in Ukraine unified Russian society. An absolute majority of Russians support the special military operation.” In September, this war propaganda trope will become a part of the official school curriculum in Russia. It will be among many other lies about the war in Ukraine that will...
Erwin Chemerinsky: When is it wrong to urge social media platforms to take down false information?
A recent decision by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit puts in jeopardy one of the few tools that exist to deal with false speech on the internet. The court ruled that the White House, the FBI, the surgeon general’s office and the...
Peter Kastor: Hunter Biden joins other presidential children who stained White House reputation
Hunter Biden, the surviving son of President Joe Biden, was indicted Sept. 14 on gun-related charges — facing a possible criminal trial while his father is campaigning for reelection. The charges relate to Hunter’s alleged lying about his drug use when he purchased a gun in 2018. And a conviction...
Cal Thomas: The ‘hypocrisy’ label has lost its power
There was a time in bygone America when calling someone a “hypocrite” or claiming they were guilty of hypocrisy was equivalent to branding them with a scarlet letter or the mark of Cain. Today, in an era of opinion polls, trendsetting and ever-shifting political winds, hypocrisy means little to nothing....
Natalie Florence and Heather Ross: Shelters can help homeless by providing quiet and privacy, not just a bunk and a meal
The city of Phoenix set heat records in summer 2023, with high temperatures that topped 110 degrees for 31 consecutive days and at least 54 days in total. In such conditions, providing basic services — including cool spaces — for people experiencing homelessness is lifesaving. In 2022, 420 people —...
Peter Morici: Cities should consider these concrete actions to house the homeless
Homeless villages under highway overpasses and tent camps in other public spaces create the appearance of a new epidemic, but historically, homelessness has been endemic to urban America. In the late 19th century, skid rows appeared in New York and other cities, where flop houses sheltered up to 75,000 people...
Brendon Slotterback: Making Forbes through Frick safe for all
In Pittsburgh, 2023 is on track to be the deadliest in recent memory for people walking in our city. In 2022, according to the City’s own data, 25 people died in car crashes within city boundaries. The transportation sector, including the cars and trucks we drive, is now the largest...
Rep. Mike Kelly: Here is the budget Congress is — and is not — actually debating
Picture this: A family of four earns $50,000 a year but spends $69,000 a year. This seems unsustainable, right? That’s because it is. Yet, the federal government does that every day — in the trillions of dollars — all with your money. This year, President Biden presented Congress with a...
Elwood Watson: Why should we care if a politician is unmarried?
It appears some Republican donors are really concerned that presidential candidate Tim Scott, South Carolina’s junior senator, is a 57-year-old bachelor — and whatever implications that may entail. Top party donors are raising concerns about the fact the conservative Black senator has never been married. and want some of their...
Emma Varvaloucas : Gen Z is dropping the college dream. It’s time for America to catch up.
For years, we have lamented the spike in college costs and accompanying student debt bloat while we teach high schoolers to covet admittance to a tiny sliver of prestigious universities — ones that refuse to enlarge incoming class sizes despite endowments the size of some small countries’ gross domestic product....
John A. Fliter and Betsy Wood: States weakening child labor restrictions 8 decades after government took kids out of workforce
A movement to weaken American child labor protections at the state level began in 2022. By June 2023, Arkansas, Iowa, New Jersey and New Hampshire had enacted this kind of legislation, and lawmakers in at least another eight states had introduced similar measures. The laws generally make it easier for...
Kathryn J. Edin, H. Luke Shaefer and Timothy J. Nelson: One overlooked way to fight opioid deaths? Give people something to do.
Across the country, communities are struggling to respond to the opioid crisis, some with broader access to medical strategies and more treatment programs. Yet the national overdose death rate continues to rise, with opioid deaths in 2022 remaining at an all-time high. There are, of course, many causes of addiction,...
Michael Reagan: Politicians’ brains are a nonpartisan issue
Seriously folks. Maybe we Republicans better stop banging on President Biden for the serious cognitive issues he obviously has. Unless we hold the players on our own team responsible for their cognitive issues, we have to stop harping on the obvious mental declines of Biden, Sen. John Fetterman and Diane...
Zach Kennedy: The Pittsburgh Pirates deserve better
A sea of overjoyed fans draped in black and gold as far as the eye could see was on its feet, pushing PNC Park to capacity on a crisp October afternoon. This was the atmosphere I faked a doctor’s appointment to enjoy during my sophomore year of high school in...
Cal Thomas: Getting the Saudi-Israel formula wrong
If one is mixing chemicals, getting the formula wrong can produce disastrous results. It is the same with international diplomacy. For decades the left was wrong about the Soviet Union and China, believing that what the U.S. did or did not do would have a positive influence on communist dictators...
Dietram A. Scheufele, Dominique Brossard and Todd Newman: Experts alone can’t handle AI; the public needs a seat at the table
Are democratic societies ready for a future in which AI algorithmically assigns limited supplies of respirators or hospital beds during pandemics? Or one in which AI fuels an arms race between disinformation creation and detection? Or sways court decisions with amicus briefs written to mimic the rhetorical and argumentative styles...
Stacy Garrity: Working to return $4.5 billion in unclaimed property
As state treasurer, one of my top priorities is returning unclaimed property to its rightful owners. Right now, the Pennsylvania Treasury Department is working to return more than $4.5 billion to hardworking people across the commonwealth. In fact, about one in 10 Pennsylvanians has money waiting. I encourage everyone to...
Bruce Cooper and Mark Reynolds: Congress, we have a problem — and it’s time for you to solve it
When it comes to climate change, sometimes it feels like we can’t see the forest for the trees — the smoldering, wildfire-ravaged trees. Public attention has been consumed this summer by shocking climate impacts. Acrid wildfire smoke has blighted skylines and polluted the air in nearly every region of the...
Greg Fulton: Russia’s insidious genocide in Ukraine
The Oxford Dictionary defines genocide as “the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group.” Throughout history, the world has been slow to recognize or respond to genocide, and in some cases unwilling to...
Christopher Decker: Jobs are up, wages less so — and lower purchasing power could still lead the US into a recession
Don’t be overly fooled by recent seemingly rosy jobs data. Yes, the U.S. economy added 187,000 jobs in August 2023 — faster than the revised 157,000 increase for July and above most analysts’ expectations for the month. And yes, gains were seen across most industries, with health care and social...
Barry C. Burden: Paper ballots are good, but accurately hand-counting them all is next to impossible
Among people, mostly Republicans, who remain the most suspicious of the 2020 presidential election results, there’s something of a movement to return to the days when election ballots in the United States were counted by hand. One 67,000-person county in Georgia recently required a hand count of all ballots, for...
