Featured Commentary category, Page 4

As the Democrats prepare to meet this week in Chicago, I thought back to their tumultuous 1968 convention, the third of the 27 I covered. That’s where I cost the Democrats the presidency. At least that’s what the press secretary for that year’s defeated Democratic nominee told me. Let me...

Depending on where you live and how you want to use it, it is pretty easy to get marijuana in the U.S. At first medical marijuana, which has legitimate palliative uses, achieved widespread acceptance. Over time, however, the requirements for proof of medical use weakened, leading to de facto legalization...

J.D. Vance has just insulted every veteran who earned and wears an award for valor on their uniform. In saying Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz is guilty of “stolen valor” in representing his military career, Vance displays his ignorance of what the term means, and he misappropriates it for personal and...

Americans’ views on free speech change directions every so often. One of those times was during the protests at U.S. universities about the Israel-Hamas war. As scholars of free speech and public opinion, we set out to find out what happened and why. The Supreme Court itself, as recently as...

The Democrats’ current strategy is to manufacture enthusiasm and raise money for their presidential candidate. Easy task. Why? Because people are thrilled that President Joe Biden will not be running. Eighty percent of Americans in polls said they did not want him to seek reelection. Thus, it was easy to...

It’s a cruel summer: Surging temperatures are spiking climate anxieties, and food insecurity concerns remain urgent. In Pennsylvania, nearly 1.7 million people are food-insecure, and 2024 has seen the state’s highest SNAP enrollment ever. At the intersection of these crises is the daunting challenge of food waste: In the U.S.,...

Local activists made a mad dash effort this month to get enough support for a Pittsburgh ballot referendum that would punish local entities for any ties with Israel. Volunteers with clipboards could be found at dance parties and outside of local bars, seeking signatures from a population young enough that...

The Latin American left has a decision to make about Venezuela: Oppose Nicolás Maduro’s totalitarian bid to remain in power indefinitely or enable it. Efforts to constrain Maduro may not succeed. But giving in to him will destabilize neighboring countries — with consequences for the United States — undermine the...

Even if you didn’t care about or respect women’s choices when it comes to having children, the “childless cat ladies” comments from Donald Trump running mate J.D. Vance still are deeply problematic because they suggest a misunderstanding of a vital policy issue: fertility. In its most basic form, economists care...

Westmoreland County residents are losing faith in their government. A tax increase and the scandal in the register of wills office have rightfully garnered a lot of attention and anger, as have big paydays for elected officials. It’s time to restore the public trust. When I took office a year...

When Italian boxer Angela Carini reported that she had “never felt a punch like that” after conceding to Algeria’s Imane Khelif 46 seconds after their Olympic match began, social media exploded with accusations. Elon Musk and J.K. Rowling chimed in, accusing Khelif of being a man posing as a woman...

This year, 2024, might be the year of women’s sports. Incredible stories of women competing abound — from Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese catapulting women’s basketball into the spotlight to Olympians Simone Biles and Katie Ledecky breaking records in Paris. With the uptick in exposure to women’s sports, some are...

On average, adult men are physically stronger, more powerful, faster and have higher endurance than adult women. This is not a theory; it is an indisputable scientific fact. Although anyone with a functional brain intuitively understands that men and women are fundamentally different when it comes to athletic prowess and,...

It took a decade, but the man who left a dead bear cub in Central Park finally ‘fessed up in a social media post . Why now? Because he wanted to get ahead of a New Yorker profile that included the bear story. The magazine also obtained a photograph of...

Even before being named Kamala Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz had been having a moment. His description of President Trump and J.D. Vance as “weird” resonated with Democratic activists and the Harris campaign. His online presence for the last two weeks pleased many Democrats. He came across as...

Kamala Harris’ change in position on banning fracking has been a hot topic of discussion, and for good reason. On the one hand, political 180s are hard to justify; but on the other, for most of our history, Americans have expected their presidential candidates to gain pragmatic wisdom through political...

After nearly 10 months of constant rocket and drone attacks across the Israel-Lebanon border, Israel and Hezbollah stand at the brink of full-scale war for the first time since 2006. But more dire than Hezbollah’s rocket arsenal is the threat that it will launch an Oct. 7-style ground incursion into...

Ranked choice voting is on many state and local ballots this year, so it’s worth considering how it works in practice. Or, as we economists like to say: It’s time for some game theory. There are many ways to run a ranked choice system, but they all basically allow voters...

There’s an ongoing national conversation about the spiraling mental health crisis — which was aggravated by the pandemic — and the urgent need to put more resources toward our faltering behavioral health system. Here in Pennsylvania, this health care emergency is in many ways more dire than the U.S. overall....

There’s so much bad news that it’s sometimes hard to spot the good news. But here’s some: An economic and strategic win-win between the United States and South Korea, injecting capital, jobs, and tech knowhow into eastern Pennsylvania. Yes, that’s good news. And we can have more win-wins, if we...

Over the past few years, the legitimacy of American elections has been called into question by Democrats and Republicans. Both sides can point fingers and claim the opposing party might try to cheat, scheme or tamper with the election results in some way. At all levels, American elections have been...

This summer, more and more voters have gotten to know the gist of Project 2025, the policy opus intended to guide a second Trump administration, and they thoroughly dislike it. Which explains the project’s purported demise in recent days at the Trump campaign’s hands, just as Democrats have jump-started the...

This year’s state budget may have arrived 11 days late, but it wasn’t without some important wins for Pennsylvania schools. Headlines have highlighted $526 million to improve education funding inequity and $100 million for school facilities repairs. But another exciting opportunity lies inside the fiscal code bill: the Solar for...

As America ponders its political future, the dynamics of politics in Europe offer U.S. lawmakers interesting food for thought — the change there isn’t necessarily about a movement to political extremes but a different kind of shift. While America has a very real fascination with the Old World, observing but...

The attempted assassination of Donald Trump on July 13 added more fuel to an already fiery election season. In this case, political violence was carried out against the party that is most often found espousing it. The incident shows how uncontrollable political violence can be — and how dangerous the...