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GOP isn’t always best party for conservatives in America

I often get asked for my advice on how to vote. I’m the first to concede these requests come from a very niche slice of the electorate — that tiny remnant of people who know who I am, value my opinion and share my exasperation with both parties. I am going to answer the question. But first let me explain why I don’t like it. I think too many pundits on the left and right fall into the habit of confusing or conflating the fortunes of a party with that of their philosophy. Many come by this tendency honestly. As the parties have polarized ideologically, it’s a natural ...

Clay Travis’ offer exposed WNBA’s inclusion delusion

Leftist dogma requires adherents to assert that men can become women and should be treated as such. That wouldn’t work out so well for WNBA players. Last week, conservative talk show host Clay Travis offered to give the Las Vegas Aces $10 million — with a catch. He wants the Aces, the reigning WNBA champions, to play a game against a state champion high school boys team of his choosing. The winner of the game would receive the cash. “This will be the most money ever paid to win a single basketball game,” Travis wrote on X. “A modern day battle of the sexes.” That’s a ...

Orchids & onions

ORCHID: To the Warren Family Mission for getting hundreds of students off to a great start to the 2026-27 school year by hosting a recent giveaway of snazzy backpacks filled with fresh new school supplies. Lines that snaked around the mission’s Tod Avenue NW headquarters began forming six full hours before the giveaway. That’s clearly a strong illustration of the need for basic necessities for the new academic year in our community. It’s also a clear signal that the mission remains a vital and compassionate cog in the Greater Warren community. ONION: To those who foolishly put ...

Join the race to win war on breast cancer

The ongoing war on breast cancer brings both good news and bad news to the Mahoning Valley. The good news is that Mahoning and Trumbull counties have made great strides in attacking the disease and lowering the death toll from it. According to the National Cancer Institute within the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, those two counties rank among the lowest in the state and below the national average in incidence and in fatalities from the disease, and trend lines continue to edge lower. The bad news is that those trend lines are not diving downward as deeply or as ...

Summertime political reruns

When I was younger, so much younger than today (credit The Beatles for that lyric from “Help”), television networks would rerun programs that had originally been broadcast the previous fall and spring. A few still do, like “Wheel of Fortune” and “Jeopardy,” but those are syndicated shows. Still, it can be fun to watch programs you missed, or even ones you have seen, especially if you can impress someone with “Jeopardy” answers because you know them. Reruns that always annoy are the political ads, which start before primaries and continue until the day before the ...

News flash: We live in a mixed economy

Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed of Michigan keeps calling himself a capitalist. And the Democratic Socialists of America keep backing him to the eyeballs. Why? Because the DSA understands that El-Sayed has to say that to win over even Democrats in a moderate state like Michigan. They firmly expect that once elected, he would do as they say, which happily conforms with what he truly believes. Confusing? Yes, on purpose. But let’s move beyond this war of labels. Let’s stop using socialist and capitalist as either compliments or denunciations. The United States has a ...