WASHINGTON — The one great service of Donald Trump’s extended peregrinations on immigration policy is to have demonstrated how, in the end, there’s only one place to go. You can rail for a year about the squishy soft, weak-kneed and stupid politicians who have opened our borders to the wretched refuse of Mexico. You can […]
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Election year brings teachable moments
Editor’s note: The following are opening day remarks by Superintendent Bill Webster to Lewiston public school teachers. Good morning and welcome to the official beginning of the new school year. The start of a year is always special, and one teacher likened the first day to a second New Year’s. “It is our day to make […]
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Trump has no plans to help America’s poor
Some harsh truths: Years ago, blue-collar America suffered mightily in the loss of manufacturing jobs. Everyone knows that. Many new, high-paying factory jobs are today going unfilled because workers aren’t being trained for them. Some know that. Donald Trump has done about zero to offer these Americans a better tomorrow. Not nearly enough working white […]
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Ending poverty an impossible mission
WASHINGTON — Don’t expect a second War on Poverty, regardless of who wins the election. Picking up where Lyndon Johnson left off in the 1960s would seem a logical response to the campaign’s relentless criticism of economic inequality. But appearances are deceiving. Most proposals to reduce inequality — conspicuously from Hillary Clinton — are aimed […]
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From realism to cynicism to Trump
WASHINGTON — Only the naive have ever believed that democracy is solely a noble contest over competing ideas, proposals and solutions. Emotion looms large in every human decision, including how we cast our ballots, and smart politicians have always blended appeals to the heart and the gut with their entreaties to reason. We cherish what […]
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Not my place to absolve Nate Parker
I had decided not to see Nate Parker’s new movie. This was a tough choice. I had been looking forward with great eagerness to the October release of “Birth of a Nation,” Parker’s acclaimed account of Nat Turner’s 1831 slave uprising. But this was before I heard about the rape. Meaning the 1999 rape that […]
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Can there be smoke without any fire?
The prize quote of this incendiary political year may go to Hillary Clinton. In response to Donald Trump’s charge that the Clintons set up a pay-for-play arrangement that granted big contributors access to Clinton while she was secretary of state, Hillary Clinton said, “My work as secretary of state was not influenced by any outside […]
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The alchemy of turning bribes into gifts
Back when I worked for the claims department of a major insurance company, I got stuff. Some of the stuff consisted of tickets to Broadway shows and sporting events and sometimes I got bottles of booze, Canadian Club being a popular choice for some reason. These items were tendered to me by auto appraisers, repair […]
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Economy’s mixed signals confusing
WASHINGTON — Call it the Snooze Economy. Roughly two months before the presidential election, the economy has turned both boring and mystifying. It hardly impresses anyone, and yet this plodding performance is probably helping Hillary Clinton by minimizing bad economic news. More important: The lackluster expansion, if continued for a few more years, would represent […]
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Trump clueless on immigration policy
Behold the kinder, gentler Donald Trump. The latest of Trump’s “pivots” is more far-reaching than a stab at greater message discipline. It is an effort to make him more appealing to minorities and college-educated whites by adopting a more inclusive message. It is an attempt to engineer on the fly a “compassionate populism.” Someone at […]