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Brenda J. Linert

ABC network shares blame for Roseanne

The meeting we hold each afternoon in the Tribune Chronicle newsroom in which editors discuss story placement for the next day’s print edition became a bit more lively than usual Tuesday during discourse about how prominently we should publish the story about ABC’s firing of Roseanne Barr over her racist tweet that day. The Hollywood celebrity and star of the recently renewed ABC sitcom “Roseanne” last week tweeted, “muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes had a baby=vj.” The initials referred to Valerie Jarrett, an African-American woman who was an adviser to former ...

Players should abide by NFL anthem policy

NFL owners approved a new policy last week to address last year’s divisive protests in which many players thought it was logical to use our national anthem to bring attention to issues in America today. Taking the lead from former San Francisco 49er Colin Kaepernick, some players have been kneeling during the playing of “The Star-Spangled Banner” to protest police brutality and racial inequality. Under the new NFL rule, players must stand if they are on the field. If they prefer not to stand, they can do that by remaining in the locker room. As could have been predicted, the ...

Fortifying schools is immediate answer

I dropped off my 15-year-old son last week and watched from my car as he strolled into his high school. Like countless other students, he slung his backpack casually over his shoulders and entered the building, passing a school resource officer seated at the front security counter with little or no interaction. A horrific thought crossed my mind about how easy it would be for any student to enter any school building with a backpack loaded with firearms, explosives or any other weapon while receiving barely a glance from the police officer guarding the door. Two days later, shots rang ...

Taiwan offers good model of democracy

Of 140,445 registered Trumbull County voters, only 34,844 — less than a quarter — cast ballots for Tuesday’s primary election, despite having virtually an entire month to do so. Sadly, this pitiful voter turnout is what we, as Americans, have come to view as acceptable in our democracy. What can be incredibly eye-opening, however, is traveling around the world to nations that take their democratic responsibility even more seriously. I spent last week in Taiwan, a small Democratic republic located off the coast of communist China. A 1949 split in which members of a Chinese ...

Greetings from the other side of the world

Lin-ho’! As you’re reading this, I already will have touched down, God willing, at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport after my nearly 14-hour flight from Los Angeles. I’m traveling this week with an international delegation of journalists, invited by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for Taiwan, intended to introduce the media — and hence, the world — to Taiwan’s political and economic development. This island nation, still considered part of the Republic of China, seems to be growing ever more independent — much to China’s chagrin. Last week, China exercised ...

Intentions alone don’t bring jobs to the area

Does the name Element Electronics mean anything to you? It may not since the company doesn’t manufacture anything here. But the name sure means something to the many workers inside the Element Electronics TV manufacturing facility in Winnsboro, S.C. The company is owned and operated by Trumbull County native Mike O’Shaughnessy. O’Shaughnessy, who graduated from Champion High School in 1985 and later from The Ohio State University, wanted sincerely to bring a plant here to his hometown, but after months of going nowhere in his 2013 negotiations with officials in Warren, ...