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Columns/Opinion

Beware of the predator in a cage next door

An Illinois woman and her child were recently injured after being attacked by an escaped pet caracal, a large exotic cat similar to a lynx. Both were hospitalized, and police killed the caracal. No doubt frightened, this wild animal experienced the briefest glimmer of freedom before officers were forced to take lethal action. There is not one legitimate reason why anyone “needs” to keep a tiger in a backyard pen, an alligator in a kiddie pool, a python in an aquarium or a bear in the basement. Like face tattoos, wild animals are procured for the “wow” factor, but the ...

Trump gives up on census question. Score one for nation

The announcement late Tuesday by the Trump administration that it would drop efforts to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census is a victory not only for a more accurate census but for the rule of law. The administration had insisted that it needed to ask everyone across the country next year whether they were U.S. citizens to help it enforce the Voting Rights Act, a laughably thin excuse for an administration that cares naught for voting rights. The truth emerged early on. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said the request had come from Justice Department officials. But he ...

How Democrats define themselves

Dave Anderson The Baltimore Sun College professors spend a lot of time distinguishing different theories and points of view within disciplines, choosing their language very carefully to distinguish the different camps, defending some and criticizing others. Politics, interestingly, is very similar. Candidates and political parties invest enormous amounts of resources and time defining which candidates and positions they support and which they oppose. They go out of their way to tar the other side with labels and concepts they find negative and to define themselves through ideas ...

Manchin must take action on climate change

By Danielle Walker As a mother and a state official, I think about the health and well-being of West Virginia’s children every day. Unfortunately, many of our leaders in Washington do not. Nowhere is this more evident than their failure to take action on climate change, the single biggest threat to our children’s health and future. My two sons are among the 34,779 children in West Virginia suffering from asthma. This was one of the issues that spurred me to run for the West Virginia House of Delegates, because I know we must clean up the pollution in our state that makes asthma ...

Selling out Nike’s jobs to ‘outrage’

If you’re looking for heroes in the battle over the flag-emblazoned shoes Nike made and then recalled, you’re out of luck. The shoe giant made the first mistake when it tried to monetize American patriotism by introducing a new rendition of a 32-year-old shoe, the Nike Air Max 1, just in time for the Fourth of July with an early version of the American flag emblazoned on its heel. It’s hardly the first apparel company to try to profit off of flag worship, but still — commercializing the flag is tacky. In this case, the flag was the 13-star, 13-stripe version commonly ...

Is the political cartoonist an endangered species?

Here’s how I define unnerving times: When professionals who write, draw or talk about current events for a living worry that if they dare create anything satiric, mocking or funny, they’ll be laid off, shut down, let go or put through the wringer. America’s — and the world’s — increasing inability to tolerate irony, dissonance and humor is enough to make you bite your tongue or, worse, put your pencil down, as if democracy’s test has just been declared at an end. I’m particularly worried about the future of political cartoonists. The best political cartoonists, ...