Issues
The Inescapable Issue
Powers beyond our control, breeding crises no one saw coming, have changed politics in the blink of an eye: Pearl Harbor did that. So did 9/11. And Covid. The ‘unexpected’ makes predicting the outcome of an election a year away risky business. For all we know Putin may invade Poland next. Or Kim Jong Un…
Read MoreChanging Sexes
I read the story on the front page of the newspaper: A four-year-old girl told her parents she wanted to be a boy. Her parents said no. Angry, the child threw fits, hyperventilating. Her mother searched for the words ‘gender identity’ on the internet, talked with therapists, doctors. A year later her family, starting down…
Read MoreA State-Owned Healthcare Monopoly
For years Republicans believed free markets – not monopolies, not government – cured problems. It seems those days are past. UNC Healthcare – which owns hospitals and medical clinics across North Carolina – is controlled, owned, and subsidized by state government. And the State Senate just passed a bill to exempt it from anti-trust laws.…
Read MoreAbandoning Faith
A Gothic church built in the 19th century turned into a skateboard park in the 21st century. Every year thousands of churches shut down, end up being apartments, parks, demolished. At the end of the 20th century 62% of Americans said religion was very important to them – twenty three years later, in the 21st…
Read MoreAbortion
When the Supreme Court made abortion legal – five decades ago – liberals thought, It’s a woman’s body – she has a right to decide whether to have an abortion. Conservatives, grimacing, saw abortion as taking an innocent life. To them, it was a choice between right and wrong. And protecting an innocent life was…
Read MoreHunter Biden
Tammany Hall’s roots go all the way back to Aaron Burr. Once, years after Burr, a Tammany Hall boss boasted, ‘Honest graft made me rich.’ It’s a story as old as our Republic: A politician lands in Congress, learns dishonest graft lands him in jail but honest graft – ‘influence peddling’ – is no crime.…
Read MoreNo Small Thing
My doctor used to be in a family practice owned by doctors. Then, I’m not sure how, the practice became part of UNC Health Care. It was like they told my doctor, You have to see a patient every twenty minutes. Now, wham, bam, thank you ma’am – you’re in and out. I told a…
Read MoreFox Poll on Guns
If you don’t watch Fox News, you may have missed its poll on guns: “Voters favor gun limits over arming citizens to reduce gun violence.” The April 21-24 nationwide survey found: This time, Fox News isn’t fake news. Yet, Congress and the North Carolina legislature will do nothing. Thank the NRA.
Read MoreKnock, knock. Bang, bang
Across the county, innocent people – including children and teenagers – are getting shot for ringing the wrong doorbell or turning into the wrong driveway. A reader asks: “Who in the world would want to do Meals on Wheels, sell Girl Scout cookies or knock on doors to campaign?” Don’t ask me to do any…
Read MoreSign of the Times?
Jules Verne wrote three stories about balloons – now balloons are back floating across the sky above us. What on earth can China be thinking? After a fighter jet shot down a balloon over Lake Huron China shrugged, said we’d sent ten spy balloons sailing across China – so now the problems not just spy…
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