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Letters to the editor

Trump, friends are election fraudsters DEAR EDITOR: The FBI raided the Ohio Organizing Collaborative located near Cleveland on June 11 looking for suspicious voting practices. It was unknown if they had search warrants. Over 100 agents in eight locations interrogated staff, followed them to their cars and homes, took computers and called their phones. They would not explain their purpose even to elected officials. Did the administration send a message of intimidation by going after this and other groups? Just a few decades ago the FBI harassed voters in Mississippi. They would not ...

State lawmakers must act promptly on 3 critical issues

The official start of summer this weekend also ushers in the end of state lawmaking in Columbus. Yes, the long summer recess gives our technically part-time state legislators time to relax and regroup in their home districts while gathering constituent input on a wide swath of crucial unfinished business that awaits them in the fall. Much of that unfinished business centers on controversial issues that require closure by the end of the year. Placed high atop that action agenda must be property tax reform, data center regulation and the death penalty. To its credit, this session of ...

Sound off!

Gov. DeWine is calling for Ohio’s death penalty to be abolished. If inmates are found guilty of heinous crimes and after a reasonable number of appeals are heard, those felons should be put to death by firing squad. That way, there is no need for chemicals (DeWine’s complaint). “Our money is better spent on keeping the violent offenders out of society,” DeWine said. If they are executed in a timely manner, taxpayers’ money wouldn’t be wasted on their lifetime in prison. — Warren With the closure of Trumbull Memorial, vehicle traffic on Eastland Avenue has increased ...

Trump’s nonvictory is a terrible failure

Trump again claims victory in Iran. He’s claimed victory before, but now he has a so-called “agreement” with Iran. That agreement, which appears to be no more than a memo of understanding — that is, a set of principles to which Iran and the United States have agreed — stops the fighting and reopens the Strait of Hormuz but it does not deal with the issue that caused Trump to initiate the conflict: Iran’s nuclear program. Keep that in mind as you hear various renditions of what’s been decided. Recall that the Strait of Hormuz was open before Trump began bombing Iran. At ...

Removal of Trump’s name a metaphor?

In what could be a metaphor for things to come, workers removed President Trump’s name from the Kennedy Center in Washington. U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper ruled the rebranding of the Kennedy Center as the “Trump Kennedy Center” violated the law, writing, “Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it.” Is America growing tired of Trump’s nonstop appearances? His disapproval ratings suggest overexposure could be a contributing factor. He goes on sometimes for more than an hour in his frequent Oval Office appearances and often repeats ...

It’s a requiem for privacy

When President Donald Trump appointed an obviously unqualified friend, a home builder executive, to be acting director of national intelligence, he inadvertently triggered attention to Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The director of national intelligence is the head of the umbrella agency that gathers intelligence from the 17 federal spying agencies and from that data prepares and delivers the president’s daily briefing. Sec. 702, which permits warrantless spying, expires this month. Trump prefers to receive his briefings directly from the CIA and its foreign ...