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Independent free press at tipping point

Next year we celebrate America’s 250th anniversary, and yet one of the most critical components of our free society — an independent, unbiased free press — is at a tipping point, and you have more power than ever to determine what happens next. There’s a lot not to like about the news right now. Many people are tuning out, turning away, or feeling like the media no longer serves them. That frustration is legitimate. But at Spotlight PA — a nonprofit, nonpartisan statewide newsroom — we’re charting a bold, fresh new course. So as you consider the causes and organizations ...

Elections focus on economy

The United States of America is 3.8 million square miles, filled with 340 million people, producing over $30 trillion in gross domestic product per year. We are the fourth-largest country by land, third by population and first by GDP. We no longer know each other, care for each other or like each other. We are a nation of isolated people staring at screens and filled with existential terrors about the other, whoever the other might be. On Tuesday night across America, those existential terrors played out with fear of the other. Hispanic voters who voted for President Donald Trump ...

Age of madness, collapse of fear

When a 29-year-old man in Minnesota can post a TikTok video allegedly offering $45,000 for the assassination of former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, we can’t dismiss it as another outburst from an online extremist. It’s a symptom of something far deeper — the moral corrosion of our civic life. According to the FBI, Tyler Avalos uploaded a video on Oct. 16 captioned: “WANTED: Pam Bondi. REWARD: $45,000. DEAD OR ALIVE (PREFERABLY DEAD),” complete with Bondi’s image in a rifle’s crosshairs. This wasn’t done in secret corners of the dark web. It was posted openly on ...

Tried and true ways to dull the pain of reality

Are you, like me, kind of freaking out a little bit? Do masked men patrol your city streets, snatching people up and throwing them into vans headed for overcrowded detention centers where they will be held incommunicado and pressured to sign self-deportation orders that abrogate their rights to a fair trial? Have your lawmakers all seemingly gone on an extended vacation? Did your commander-in-chief use your money to tear down a third of the most prominent national symbol of the transience of presidential power so that he can erect a ballroom vulgar enough to make Saddam Hussein ...

Nothing, not even a stable job, is guaranteed

This week, as I was going through my online news feeds, which included updates on the government shutdown, I came across several stories about furloughed federal workers and contractors standing in line at food banks in Maryland and the D.C. area. In Landover, Maryland, the lines were long, with cars parked on the street near the Capital Area Food Bank. Just over four miles away in Hyattsville, Maryland, photos captured the expressions of apprehension of those patiently waiting for food. Some in line, probably wanting to conceal their identities, were wearing sunglasses. Some were ...

Democrats are stuck on repeat

What do you do when voters have rejected your party’s policies and the losers have nothing new to offer? Answer: You stage large demonstrations that include name calling (this from Democrats who have called for “lowering” the rhetorical temperature). Anyone who believes last Saturday’s “No Kings” (was that poll tested?) demonstrations across the country were not organized and largely paid for by left-wing groups hasn’t been paying attention. The New York Times claims there is “no evidence” that the event was subsidized by billionaire George Soros and other far-left ...