Opinion category, Page 476
Letter to the editor: Aid to Taliban?
The Biden administration is considering sending foreign aid to the Taliban! I believe this is nothing but a ransom payment disguised as “aid” so the average American won’t realize. This will be the administration’s politically palatable way to extricate any people left in Afghanistan by the botched withdrawal who they...
Letter to the editor: Calling out sign-destroyers
On Sept. 11, Irwin had a nice celebration on Main Street with bands and many food trucks. My wife and I attended and had a very good time. The next morning, we woke to a real shock. There’s a “We Support Our Local Police” sign on our yard, which we...
Letter to the editor: Effectiveness of cloth masks questioned
Earlier this year, a medical sales representative called into a local radio program regarding surgical masks. It was her specialty. She talked about particulates, screening properties and interceptor efficiencies. A clear example of poor filtering was that you shouldn’t be able to smell aromas through it. Such particulates are much...
Editorial: Mistakes were made in Wolf’s early pandemic business waivers
Sometimes a state audit unpacks surprises. Other times it just tells you exactly what you expected to hear. This week, Pennsylvania Auditor General Timothy DeFoor released a look into Gov. Tom Wolf’s waiver program that let some businesses reopen amid covid-19 shutdowns in 2020. It is completely unsurprising that DeFoor...
Letter to the editor: Republicans not ‘protecting integrity’
Republican legislators, who’ve dominated our state Legislature for decades, intend to overturn the mail-in voting law they all voted to pass in 2019. They now plan to cast doubt on the outcome of Pennsylvania’s 2020 election results by holding an Arizona-style audit of those votes, claiming irregularities and improprieties allowed...
John Stossel: Corporate welfare
Today’s politicians want to spend more on everything: Amtrak subsidies, sports stadium subsidies, green energy subsidies, even fossil fuel subsidies … President Biden says the handouts will “put more money in your pocket.” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi claims they will “protect the planet for the children.” They might. But a...
S.E. Cupp: AOC’s dress and America’s priorities
The tickets go for $35,000 a head. A table can cost more than $200,000. The room is crammed with some of the world’s wealthiest celebrities, donning thousand-dollar gowns and suits, at an event meant to celebrate, in many ways, excess itself. Here, at the infamous annual Met Gala, is where...
Mark Compton: Turnpike users must pay fair share
Our goal at the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission is to collect all revenue that we generate. While leakage is an established part of the tolling business, as it is in any retail business model, it is something we take seriously. It has always been a part of tolling, even in a...
Leonard Pitts Jr.: Activism is not a popularity contest
“He wears the clothes of a dissenter, but there’s a logo on his back.” — from “Damn It, Rose,” by Don Henley. When he died, Martin Luther King was likely the most hated man in America. This is a fact obscured by decades of veneration so intense that even conservatives...
Letter to the editor: We have responsibilities to each other
When I listen to the minority of Americans who are defiant and enraged anti-vacciners and anti-indoor-mask- wearers, I can’t help but think back to when I was a teenage boy, and I was listening to presidential candidate Robert Kennedy over my transistor radio saying that we need to talk about what...
Letter to the editor: If masks offer even slim protection, why not wear them?
As I read the articles on the efforts of parents and school districts to deal with the mask/no mask issue, I also read this information: More than a quarter-million children had new cases of covid in just the last week of August, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP)....
Lori Falce: Do you have a right to privacy?
If you want to have an impassioned discussion about the right to privacy, you don’t want to engage with a constitutional law scholar or a talk radio host. Find a teenager and suggest that you have casually scrolled through text messages. You will be treated to breathless defense of our...
Letter to the editor: Thanks for support of district judge
To the residents of the Derry area: I want to thank all of you for the faith you showed in me over the last 30 years. Back in 1991 when I decided to run for the seat held by retiring Magisterial District Judge Michael Giannini, I could never have imagined...
Paul Kengor: Us vs. them — why we remember 9/11 differently
On Sept. 8, 2021, Grove City College President Paul McNulty spoke in downtown Pittsburgh regarding his uniquely fascinating yet somber 9/11 experiences. He played an intimate role in the prosecution of the hijackers and their associates as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia and deputy attorney general in...
Laurels & lances: Winning, losing and playing by the rules
Laurel: To a spectacular run. Victory Brinker’s parents knew what they were doing when they named her. The pint-sized opera singer with a voice as big as all outdoors showed “America’s Got Talent” exactly what kind of talent resides in Unity with her months of appearances culminating in Wednesday night’s...
Lawrence Tabas: Pennsylvanians demand accountability for Afghanistan failures
This week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken faced Congress and the American people to answer questions about his key role in orchestrating one of the biggest failures of foreign policy in our nation’s history: Joe Biden’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan. The disastrous and hasty removal of U.S. troops left 13...
Letter to the editor: Fix the Biden mess, make America great again
Wow! Can you believe? A Democrat asking “Help first, blame later!” This from Democrats who, for four years, 24/7 blamed President Trump for every little error coming down the pike? You made Biden president. Now you fix the mess he has made. Yes, make America great again. Frances Olyarnik Greensburg...
Letter to the editor: Redistricting committee suggestion
Regarding the article “4 takeaways from new Pa. census data and what it means for redistricting” (Aug. 22, TribLIVE): To prevent such political turnaround, I feel no politicizing of the census could be made by a panel of 15. Five Republicans, five Democrats and five independents or third-party should make...
Letter to the editor: Medicare cuts worrisome
As I work with Medicare seniors in Pennsylvania, I am concerned about prospective cuts to clinical lab services. In January 2022, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is scheduled to cut rates for nearly 600 tests, including the top 25 most used by seniors — threatening access to...
Letter to the editor: Where to turn for the truth?
Never in my 65 years did I think that I would be living in a world of such complete absurdity and foreboding. In generations past at least we had a grasp on reality and truth. That is no longer the case. There is almost nowhere to turn for trustworthy, reliable...
Letter to the editor: Trump associates’ corruption
In my letter “Crimes among Trump associates” (March 9, TribLIVE), I suggested that if Trump associates’ corruption does not amount to criminal activity, but they are lawyers, they should be disbarred. Guess what? Rudy Giuliani’s law license has been suspended in New York and Washington, D.C., and he may be...
Editorial: The $104 million failure of turnpike ‘toll-by-plate’
In 2019, the first Southwestern Pennsylvania toll booths started to change as the Turnpike Commission switched from a mix of manned stations and machines to a new, hands-off system. It started years earlier with the E-ZPass devices that let drivers roll through while a transponder was read and an account...
Letter to the editor: Biden had courage to end war
I feel that I must respond to the letter “In Afghanistan, history repeats itself” (Sept. 7, TribLIVE). Many, many historical facts were omitted. First and foremost was President Bush’s Iraqi war that halted all the progress we made in Afghanistan between 2001 and 2002. America would have been out of...
Jonah Goldberg: Biden’s stance will feed pandemic culture war
Maybe President Biden should handle covid-19 the way he’s handled Afghanistan. It’s a strange thought, given how badly he botched the U.S. withdrawal. But at least Afghanistan Joe had a clear idea about what we needed to do. Covid Joe has no such exit strategy. He’s making it up as...
Letter to the editor: Suppression of cheating, not votes
The idea that those bad Republicans want to suppress votes (read minorities) is really old stuff (“Voter suppression to resume,” Sept. 7, TribLIVE). Maybe ’50s or ’60s. Let’s find a new slander. Suppression of cheating is the intent, and that worries some folks. As far as grape jelly goes, 9-year-olds...
