Opinion category, Page 754
Editorial: Treat record-high drug addiction in jail
Addiction threatens our safety and our wallets. We know that people have drug problems. If it isn’t in your family, it’s an other-people problem. If you don’t take pills, or heroin, or cocaine, why is it something that you have to think about? It’s because more of the people around...
Letter to the editor: More information on U.S. Steel’s Clairton plant
Your article “How residents grapple with life in the shadows of U.S. Steel’s Clairton Plant” (June 15, TribLIVE) appears incomplete in several respects. First, Clairton supplies almost all of the coke to U.S. Steel’s operations in the U.S. If shut, U.S. Steel would need to import coke to operate and...
Letter to the editor: Call for Styrofoam ban
The unsustainable amount of single- use plastics that Americans use every day terrifies me: 150 million tons of plastic produced each year are used only once, and the problem continues to worsen. Styrofoam, which is very difficult to recycle, is a big contributor to this problem. It makes up a...
Letter to the editor: Wealth tax could decrease poverty
I would like to see Congress pass a new program into law to replace the former Aid To Families With Dependent Children program, which was passed under FDR in 1935 and abolished in 1996. Since its abolition, there has been a large increase in the number of people (especially children)...
Letter to the editor: Standing up to China on trade
Here’s why President Donald Trump needed to stand up for American workers and stop the bleeding on our economy: Our trade deficit with China went from $29 billion to $83 billion under President Bill Clinton between 1994-2000; from $83 billion to $268 billion under President George W. Bush from 2001-08;...
Tom Purcell: Alleged would-be ISIS bomber could have lived American dream
Here’s the worst part: He had every opportunity to choose life. Last week, 21-year-old Mustafa Mousab Alowemer was arrested for allegedly plotting to bomb a small Christian church on Pittsburgh’s North Side. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, his motivation was to support the cause of ISIS. And he...
G. Terry Madonna & Michael Young: The Democrats’ debate marathon
Who will win the 2020 presidential election seems endlessly debatable — and the Democrats are preparing to demonstrate just how endless that debate will be. Overall there will be 12 sanctioned Democratic presidential debates during the party’s nomination battle, six of them in 2019 with six more in 2020. The...
Editorial: UPMC, Highmark still need permanent solution
Break out the champagne. The crisis has been averted. No, not the tensions surrounding U.S. and Iranian relations. No, not North Korea. It’s not the war on drugs or the war on terror or even the war on Christmas. The peace treaty on the table is between Highmark and UPMC....
Letter to the editor: Peduto on Pittsburgh terrorist bomb plot
Had the refugee’s plot been carried out (“Syrian refugee charged with plotting to bomb Pittsburgh church”), Mayor Bill Peduto would have known how to shine. Virtue-signaling his way through the myriad of press conferences like a virtuoso, he’d condemn any animosity Pittsburghers might dare have, sermonize ad nauseam in an...
Letter to the editor: On abortion, let’s build bridges
Believe it or not, most individuals who identify as pro-choice are not cold blooded baby-killers seeking to advance a culture of death. And guess what? Most individuals who identify as pro-life are not religious bigots and misogynists hell-bent on oppressing women. After over 40 years of emotional rhetoric and demeaning...
Editorial cartoons for the week of June 24
Editorial cartoons for the week of June 24....
Mallard Fillmore cartoons for the week of June 24
Mallard Fillmore cartoons for the week of June 24....
Robert Ciervo: We must protect integrity of female athletics
In the ongoing debate about protecting the integrity of female athletics, I firmly believe female track athletes should only have to compete against their peers — not biological males, regardless of how those male athletes identify in terms of gender, which is a man-made construct. As a former Division I...
Mitchel Nickols: Advocates look out for patients
Chances are, most of us will become or know someone as a patient during our lifetime. The need to have a friend or loved one access or communicate with a medical professional about your care may necessitate having a patient advocate. A patient’s privacy is protected by the Health Insurance...
Editorial: Pennsylvania gave women voice with vote
Women get to have a say. That shouldn’t surprise anyone. It should seem obvious. Of course a woman gets a seat at the table, a voice in a discussion. Of course all women should have that opportunity. But it was just 100 years ago that Pennsylvania said that, yes, every...
Letter to the editor: Fight to end Alzheimer’s
During June, Alzheimer’s & Brain Awareness Month, the Alzheimer’s Association needs you to get involved to help raise awareness about Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias. Everyone is at risk to develop Alzheimer’s, a disease that is often misunderstood. Alzheimer’s is not normal aging; it’s a progressive brain disease without any...
Letter to the editor: Vaccination wards off disaster
This country was once full of plagues and short life expectancies, but when immunizations changed everything. Unfortunately, now some people view immunizations as a right rather than a requirement. When we stop vaccinating, epidemics ensue. Take Japan in 1974. When pertussis was at all-time lows, the country stopped requiring vaccination...
Letter to the editor: Stop Iranian oil tanker attacks
After two more oil tankers were attacked in the Middle East, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and President Trump stated Iran was responsible for the attacks. This brings to six the number of oil tankers attacked by Iran. Iran is attempting to get the United States to lift its crippling...
George Will: Bernie Sanders is FDR’s unimaginative echo
WASHINGTON That the Democrats’ two evenings of dueling oratory snippets this week are called “debates” validates Finley Peter Dunne’s prediction that “when we Americans are through with the English language, it will look as if it had been run over by a musical comedy.” Already a linguistic casualty of the...
Bob Sherwin: Foster care, broken system or loving home?
Many have argued that the foster care system is broken. Dr. Phil has said it. The Boston Globe has said it. The Washington Post has said it. But as executive director of Bethany Christian Services of Western Pennsylvania and Ohio, I’m not sure I agree with this statement. While our...
Andy Carter: Pa. health care dollars at risk
A lot has changed since 1998, the year that Pennsylvania and 45 states stood up to big tobacco and helped create the Tobacco Settlement Fund (TSF). We may have moved on from CD-ROM, dial-up internet and the Y2K bug frenzy; but a few things have stood the test of time:...
Joseph Sabino Mistick: Life’s struggles hit single moms hard
Tragedy lingers. The sadness and the heartache hang in the air — especially right after and even if the victims are gone. The horrible power of the moment has its own life, cautioning us and providing a lesson. It was that way last week, when a last-minute trip to the...
Jeff Dunetz: Restrict immigration to soften blow of automation
Automation and artificial intelligence could make 54 million Americans’ jobs obsolete within the next decade, according to McKinsey & Company. Lesser-skilled jobs in manufacturing, construction and service industries will be the first to go. Increasingly, robots can perform these jobs more efficiently than humans. Robots also don’t need costly benefits...
Editorial: Another Clairton fire, another shutdown
We barely finished talking about Clairton. The Tribune-Review spent months visiting the city and talking to the people in the wake of the Christmas Eve fire at U.S. Steel’s Clairton Coke Works that shuttered pollution control systems for 2½ weeks. It came together in a Sunday feature with the stories...
Sounding off: ‘Dangerous & Crazy’ party could bring all together
Let me get this straight. The left thinks President Trump is dangerous and crazy, the right thinks Pelosi and Schumer are dangerous and crazy, both groups think Bernie is dangerous and crazy, and everybody thinks Ocasio-Cortez is dangerous and crazy. Put this all together and it proves that Americans are...
