Opinion category, Page 759
Jonah Goldberg: Kirstjen Nielsen wasn’t right for Trump’s ‘bad cop’ role
Summoned to the White House last Sunday, embattled and apparently overwhelmed secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen arrived with a resignation letter in tow. “Despite our progress in reforming homeland security for a new age,” it read, “I have determined that it is the right time for...
Editorial: Pa. rape kit progress has to continue
Imagine being robbed and finding out that, despite reporting it to police and turning over pictures and serial numbers for your TV and your laptop, the report sat on a shelf and waited for an investigation that never happened. Imagine being shot and discovering that the bullet was in an...
Sounding off: Keep the Pittsburgh airport world class
I have traveled into and out of Pittsburgh International Airport at least 240 times since the new terminal opened in 1992. My first trip was on the terminal’s first day. My wife and I arrived eight hours before our flight’s scheduled departure because we expected the newness of the airport...
Letter to the editor: Leaving the liberals
I recommend that anyone who is a member of a minority (homosexual, black, Hispanic, women, et al.) and has a deep resentment of President Trump, or who cannot understand how any rational person could support this president, view Mark Levin’s March 3 interview with #WalkAway movement founder Brandon Straka on...
Letter to the editor: Gov. Tom Wolf’s tax plan will hurt consumers
Gov. Tom Wolf must enjoy Groundhog Day, as his latest plan, Restore Pennsylvania, is simply the same attempt to tax and borrow on the backs of citizens. Like Groundhog Day, Wolf’s plan is the same every year. The only difference is that every year he masks his attempt to tax...
Letter to the editor: Climate activism not just for Democrats
Regarding the article “Gore: US getting close to political shift on climate change”: Climate activism is not just for Democrats; however, it has been associated with them. The article implies that conservatives and moderates being pushed toward action are outsiders to climate change, coming late to the party the liberals...
Joseph Sabino Mistick: Trump’s disdain for law & order
“Cruella De Vil” and “The Queen of Mean” are just a couple of the nicknames for Kirstjen Nielsen that have been making the rounds since she was fired as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. At the end of the day, “Cruella” was not cruel enough and the “Queen”...
Nathan Benefield: How to deliver what ‘socialists’ want
Socialism has hit the mainstream — or so we’ve been told. Yes, democratic socialists are winning elections, including recent Pennsylvania victories in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and Bernie Sanders is again a frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination. But does this mean Americans’ political views have U-turned from free-market capitalism? That’s...
John Stossel: Mark Zuckerberg’s cronyism
Please, regulate me! That was Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s message to Congress recently. “Lawmakers often tell me we have too much power over speech, and frankly I agree,” he wrote in an op-ed. “(W)e shouldn’t make so many important decisions … on our own.” It sounds so self-sacrificing. But give me...
Walter Williams: Tragedy of socialism
If one needed evidence of the gross ignorance of millennials, and their teachers and college professors, it’s their solid support for socialism and socialist presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders. Socialism has produced tragedy wherever it has been implemented. Last year marked the 40th anniversary of nearly 1,000 Americans perishing in...
Editorial: Prosecuting Peduto for gun ban is wrong move
Six members of Pittsburgh’s city council and Mayor Bill Peduto have taken steps to change the law within their sphere of influence as applies to a certain class of weapon. It was a big step. The U.S. and Pennsylvania constitutions both uphold gun ownership as a right. But both also...
Letter to the editor: Fund our own security
In January, the U.S. House of Representatives passed House Resolution 21, the Consolidated Appropriations Act, which included over $35 billion in foreign aid. Funds are allocated to fight illegal immigration, terrorism, and sex and drug trafficking; secure borders; assist refugees; fund peace-keeping, disaster assistance and global security efforts; finance militaries;...
Letter to the editor: No ‘accord’ in Paris
President Trump has been the target of much criticism since he withdrew the United States from the Paris climate accords after taking office. It’s worth noting, however, that “Paris” itself has also more or less withdrawn from the accords. Parisian “yellow vest” protesters and 282,000 French citizens in general began...
Letter to the editor: Minimum-wage apocalypse
I have been waiting for nearly a half-century for the minimum-wage apocalypse, wherein smaller businesses (and some large chain restaurants) “seize up,” fail to function and fail in business terms. Such are the highly predictable diatribes by “economists” every time raising the minimum wage is broached. I refer to Lloyd...
Timothy L. O’Brien: Bill Barr is trying hard to be President Trump’s Roy Cohn
The attorney general of the United States is, we now know, quite sure of himself. Exhibit A: Spying During Senate testimony on Wednesday, William Barr was asked if, as Bloomberg News reported, he was planning to review how and why the Federal Bureau of Investigation launched an investigation into possible...
Lori Falce: Julian Assange arrest not a press attack
You, Julian Assange, are not a journalist. I know you like to claim that you are, largely because you like to hide behind the protections journalists are sometimes afforded when it comes to obtaining and releasing information and questioning authority. But what you have done is not journalism. It has...
Laurels & lances: Ligonier, light, lessons and love
Laurel: To preserving a little piece of the past. Ligonier Township leaders don’t want lose their connection to a treasured longtime landmark. Instead, the municipality is interested in buying Ligonier Beach to keep the private pool from floundering after the owners filed for bankruptcy. Details are still up in the...
Letter to the editor: Trump our general in battle
I believe we are teetering dangerously on the verge of a civil war over the heart and soul of our country. The conservatives want to preserve this country as it was founded, based on the Constitution and with all of its freedoms and opportunity. I believe the leftist/progressives want to...
Letter to the editor: Lessons from Westerns
I hate to admit it, but I learned some moral lessons from the TV Westerns I watched as a kid. For example, I learned that a lawman was a coward if he shot another man in the back, even if the man he shot was a gunslinger or a horse...
Letter to the editor: Where’s outrage over Trump’s McCain comments?
As a veteran I find it disgusting that the president of the United States would insult a decorated combat veteran, POW and U.S. senator. President Trump’s continuing childish comments about the late Sen. John McCain are insulting to not only the McCain family, but to all veterans. This from a...
Paul Kengor: Frustrated feminists confront gender orthodoxy
Picture an elderly British man opening his newspaper and sharing this story with his wife: “A 52-year-old woman is guilty of raping two other women at a facility in West Yorkshire. Claiming to be suffering from erectile dysfunction, she assaulted the two women.” The gentleman scratches his head and says...
George Will: Cain, Moore nominations are two more tests for Republicans to fail
WASHINGTON In 1964, although there was scant chance that Americans would choose to have a third president in 14 months, Lyndon Johnson took no chances. The economy was sizzling and in November Johnson would carry 44 states. Nevertheless, he wanted low interest rates, so he summoned to his Texas ranch...
Editorial: Toomey’s common-sense solution to gun law loophole
Listen to squabbles about gun control and you are bound to hear one question come up, either from frustrated proponents of limits or aggrieved champions of the Second Amendment. Why don’t we just enforce the rules we already have? If the two sides would actually listen to each other, they...
Letter to the editor: Pot & government vultures
I’m writing to deliver the same message as letter-writer John Waite (“Legal pot is a Pandora’s box,” March 21, TribLIVE). It is a disgrace to all Pennsylvanians that the vultures in our government can attempt to legalize recreational marijuana. We pay and pay, and they don’t care — they just...
Letter to the editor: Minimum wage will hurt young, poor
Yet again Democrats seek to increase the minimum wage. But that is a bad idea because it will hurt those it is supposed to help. If the minimum wage were raised to $15 an hour, those already making $15, $20 and up would need raises also. These raises would drastically...
