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Will increasing pay for rail safety inspectors help?

Rail safety reform is not a matter of partisan politics — or it shouldn’t be, anyway. But since February 2023, when a derailment in East Palestine ignited renewed calls for reform, politicians in Washington, D.C., have sat on their hands while their friends in the railroad industry made promises and assurances that weren’t worth the paper their public relations teams hoped it would be printed on. This week, U.S. Sens. Jim Justice, R-W.Va., and Gary Peters, D-Mich., are giving it another shot, with a bill that would increase pay for federal railroad inspectors and ...

Ask employers if you’re curious about their needs

Want to know what Ohio employers need? Ask the employers. A novel idea, maybe, but doing so helped the Ohio Manufacturers’ Association complete its Good Jobs Challenge grant eight months ahead of schedule, while blowing past every performance goal set. In 2022, the U.S. Economic Development Administration supported the $23.4 million initiative with the largest workforce investment in the association’s history. The idea was to scale up WorkAdvance, which lets employers take the lead in building the short-term job-skills, technical instruction and other supports that get them the ...

Why Islam threatens liberty

Little kids aren’t the only ones who act like closing their eyes will keep them safe. Look at how many people want to avoid discussing how Islam threatens liberty. In 1992, Imam Siraj Wahhaj said, “If only Muslims were clever politically, they could take over the United States and replace its constitutional government with a caliphate.” In 2007, Imam Abdul Alim Musa was leading As-Sabiqun, an organization that was working to create an “Islamic State of North America no later than 2050.” A survey of current Muslim countries and a review of history show that outcome would ...

Many influencers are con artists

Not all of them. Some influencers simply want to persuade and perhaps help others better their lives or their community. Their subject could be politics, economics, music, health or fashion. But social media has become inundated with influencers who harm their devotees, some on purpose. Or make money off their trusting audience by endorsing so-so products. Influencers are people who build followers on social media or other digital platforms. They use the attention to shape opinions, tastes, or get the audience to buy stuff. They post comments, videos, reviews, or endorsements, often ...

Vaccines are tools you can use for health

Have you gotten your annual flu or COVID-19 shots yet this season? It’s a good idea, both because it protects you and your families AND because it helps protect those in more vulnerable populations. For many of us, getting those two protections has become simply part of the fall routine — and rightly so. Similarly, for most families, making sure everyone is up to date on other vaccinations, such as against measles, is an important item to check off the list. An alarmingly increasing number of people are failing to take that step, however, and Ohio’s third measles outbreak of ...

Why parents sometimes need to go to school, too

Everybody, according to an old saying of unknown but apparently wise origin, is an expert at raising other people’s kids. One child of recent national interest is the daughter of Nikole Hannah-Jones, the journalist who led “The 1619 Project,” a controversial and Pulitzer Prize-winning reexamination of American history through the lens of slavery, instead of treating that American horror story as a sidelight. In a conversation that occurs in middle-class black households nationwide, including mine, Hannah-Jones and her husband, Faraji Hannah-Jones, decided to take a bold, ...