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Some are chasing false gods

My sadly departed friend, Frank, was a unicorn. He lived 89 years in the town he grew up in, a village on the Connecticut shore. A reporter at his local newspaper for over half a century, he had turned down offers to work for more glamorous publications, among them Sports Illustrated and The New York Times. Frank had considered the priesthood in his youth. He stopped going to church and claimed he wasn't part of it anymore, but the church's moral teachings clearly stayed put. Frank approached reporting as a kind of ministry, spending much time talking with his "flock." His ...

Britain's government unstable for past years

As Britain gets ready for its seventh prime minister in just 10 years, it's time to ask whether the parliamentary system itself is broken. Britain's Labour party started out as a vehicle for the working class, in theory. It was closely connected to the country's major ...

'Build Freedom' to reinvigorate skilled trades

For decades, the story written about river towns in post-industrial Pennsylvania and Ohio, or places like Macomb County, Michigan, and the small communities outside of Fort Worth, Texas, has been one of decline. It is a familiar, weary Beltway narrative about the Rust Belt and the ...

America's momentous birthday

I consider it an incredible blessing to have witnessed two of America's great milestone birthdays: the 200th celebration in 1976, when I was a rising second grader, and now the 250th anniversary as an older, seasoned adult. Looking back to 1976, as a kid, I enjoyed the fireworks and the parades I watched on television, and for me, this was a time of innocence when I began to learn about our country's principal ideals of freedom, individual liberty, opportunity and democracy. Although the suffering of Native Americans was glossed over in school, and the contributions and ...

My job doesn't get to decide the tides

Last year, the waves lapping on the beach convinced a mountain girl that the sea has its own charms. This year, the waves reminded me that parts of me that I feared had sailed away were actually just in murky depths, waiting to be stirred up and brought forward by the tides of ...

What America can learn from others

Americans just love to be part of something bigger than themselves. Yes, we will fiercely defend our individualism. But we are also uniquely aspirational about what we can do together for the greater good. This is pretty much something that we do daily when no one is looking, but ...