Search Results

Keyword search: editorial

With Opening Day* of the Major League Baseball season right around the corner, we sing today, as did the poet Virgil, of arms and the man — specifically the arms of pitchers and injuries to them.First, though, let us dispose of the Boston Red Sox, as...

It’s a great mystery why Dartmouth College, the new home of “brave spaces” for public debate, continues to pursue the criminal prosecution of a pair of peaceful pro-Palestinian student protesters accused of trespassing on their own campus.The mystery...

Last week in this space, we revisited the origins of Vermont’s school funding system in the context of panic-inducing predictions of sky-high school budgets and tax rates for next year. How that will play out is not yet clear, but the uncertainty has...

This year’s school budgeting chaos in Vermont has been justly attributed to well-intentioned legislative bungling. But revisiting the creation story of the state’s school funding system may provide useful context.In the beginning was Brigham. In 1997,...

For several weeks this winter, Hartford School Board members seemed intent on demonstrating that tennis players aren’t the only ones who commit unforced errors. In the end, they narrowly managed to avoid a double fault.We refer to the board’s highly...

Thanks to the ACLU of New Hampshire, a rough estimate can now be made of how much it will cost the state’s taxpayers to secure the Northern Border from the purported threat of undocumented immigrants crossing over from Canada. By our calculations, the...

Of all the reasons for colleges to require applicants to take a standardized test, among the most unlikely would seem to be promoting increased diversity in the student body. But that is precisely the rationale cited by Dartmouth this week in...

Polls show that large majorities of Americans sense that the wealthiest members of society are not paying their fair share. That perception reflects reality: With income inequality hovering near historic highs, the poorest 20% of taxpayers are...

Of all the hardships that can befall working families, loss of health insurance is among the hardest. That is the situation that nearly 30,000 Vermonters find themselves in now, having been “disenrolled” from (that is, booted off) Medicaid since last...

The New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office has ordered the Democratic National Committee to “cease and desist” from calling the state’s upcoming Democratic presidential primary “meaningless,” on the grounds that “falsely” doing so constitutes voter...

New Hampshire voters have the opportunity later this month to vindicate the extravagant claims made over many years for their political acumen and civic engagement. That is, they have the chance to inflict a grievous political wound on Donald...

On one hand, it is inexplicable that Nikki Haley would fail to cite slavery as the cause of the Civil War in response to a direct question at a town hall event in Berlin, N.H., last month. On the other hand, it is entirely too explicable in the...

Vermont still cannot quite make up its mind what to do with “justice-involved” youth, the catch-all term for those under age 18 who have run afoul of the law. Lock ’em up? Or provide treatment in a secure residential setting? A recently decided...

The Christmas story as told in the New Testament is a profoundly spiritual one, of course, but it has also a compelling material aspect — “because there was no room for them in the inn,” Mary and Joseph are obliged to find shelter in what one hymn...

Brattleboro civic officials are perplexed over what can, or should be, done about panhandling, which is rife in their downtown. In this they are hardly alone. Communities elsewhere in Vermont and New Hampshire are struggling with the same issue;...

A federal lawsuit filed on behalf of Mid Vermont Christian School last month poses the question of whether Vermont taxpayers can be compelled to financially support religious indoctrination contrary to the dictates of their conscience, the state...

Bradley Haas, the unarmed security guard who was shot and killed in the lobby at New Hampshire’s state psychiatric hospital on Nov. 17, has been hailed as a hero by Gov. Chris Sununu and Attorney General John Formella. While he was all of that, Haas...

Vermont could be the face of a looming long-term national labor shortage, The New York Times reports.That is no doubt a distinction that the Brave Little State of Vermont Public media lore would cheerfully forgo. But at least it is one that it shares...

A newly sinister note of violence has crept into Donald Trump’s rhetoric recently, as witnessed by his Veterans Day speech at Stevens High School in Claremont earlier this month.You may find that hard to believe, given that the former president has...

Of all the lessons that can be drawn from last month’s horrendous mass shooting in Maine, the most obvious is that if it can happen in Lewiston, it can happen in any small town in Northern New England.Thus, the complacency expressed by some New...