ReportWire

Tag: Opinion

  • Wayne Winegarden: Why reforming PBMs is the key to lowering drug costs

    If lawmakers want to make pharmaceuticals more affordable, they should look past populist policies like price controls that will only make matters worse and set their sights on reforming the Pharmacy Benefit Manager market.

    PBMs manage the drug benefits for insurers and negotiate discounts with drug manufacturers. You probably use one every time you go to the pharmacy to get your medications refilled and don’t even realize it. The top three PBMs, which process about 80% of all prescription claims, are health conglomerates that include major insurance companies.

    PBMs argue that their negotiations lower drug costs, which logically makes sense but fails to account for an essential question: whose costs? When it comes to the drug market, this distinction is everything.

    When PBMs negotiate discounts with manufacturers, they consider the resulting net prices to be proprietary information and keep consumers in the dark. Consequently, the actual prices paid for medicines are not widely known. Since the actual transaction prices are unknown, discounts that would benefit patients in a properly functioning market are actually raising patients’ out-of-pocket spending.

    Such a bizarre outcome occurs because patients’ costs are tied to the only visible price – the drugs’ list prices. But these prices exclude the negotiated discounts. As a result, a patient whose health insurance requires a 20% co-insurance payment will spend $20 for a drug with a list price of $100. However, the actual drug cost is not $100. On average, total rebates and discounts for a drug are around 50% of the list price. So, the total cost of the drug is really $50, not $100.

    Consequently, patients are paying a 40% co-insurance rate on a drug’s net costs ($50) rather than the expected 20% rate. Insurers benefit by only needing to pay $30. Several adverse outcomes result.

    This system inequitably shifts some of the costs that should be covered by insurers to patients that require expensive medicines. As shown above, patients end up paying twice as much as they should.

    Even worse, the dollar costs shifted to patients have been growing. Since 2018, list prices for brand-name drugs have grown, but the negotiated discounts have grown even faster.

    These trends mean that the costs covered by insurers have been consistently declining. Meanwhile patients’ out-of-pocket costs, which are based on list prices, are growing.

    PBMs respond by claiming that they are faithfully serving their role by passing all the negotiated discounts to insurers. While that’s true, it is irrelevant to consumers because the PBM and the insurer are now part of the same conglomerate.

    The insurer’s justification – that they use the discounts to lower premiums for everyone – also falls flat. While also true, it means that insurers are subsidizing the costs for all beneficiaries by increasing the costs for patients who require expensive medicines. This is exactly the opposite of how insurance is supposed to work.

    These problems alone warrant reforms to how PBMs operate, but PBM operations impose even more troubling outcomes. For instance, PBMs will often receive payments from payers (especially Medicaid and Medicare) that exceed their payments to pharmacies. This practice, known as spread pricing, unnecessarily inflates costs.

    Wayne Winegarden

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  • Behind the Bylines: Meeting them where they don’t want to be

    In the final week of my journalism class, I asked my students a simple question: If given what they now know about how social media platforms are designed, should news live there? Almost all of them said no.

    When I asked where they actually get their news, almost all of them said social media.

    A recent Pew report on young adults and the future of news. U.S. adults under 30 are the least likely to intentionally follow the news and the most likely to get it from social platforms, usually by accident rather than choice. And yet, when you talk to them one-on-one, many will tell you plainly they feel more trapped by those platforms than empowered by them.

    We often characterize young people’s news consumption as if they had packed their bags and moved to TikTok in protest against traditional news outlets. The reality is much less intentional. My students are remarkably honest about not actually wanting to spend their lives in these feeds. They are not there because they made a deliberate choice to replace reported news coverage with vertical video. They are there because those platforms are quite literally engineered to keep them there.

    Nearly half of U.S. teens now say they are online “almost constantly,” despite ample research about the mental health effects and massive shifts to lessen access and dependence, including phone bans in schools, and even Australia’s recent move to ban social media for those under 16 (a move many of my students largely supported, though with some disagreements about the exact age).

    Newsrooms and journalism schools should be honest about the impact and trajectory of designing strategies that tap into the same compulsive systems that many of them feel trapped by. Should we celebrate that a clever explainer finally went viral without asking why we are so comfortable hitching civic information to the same slot machine that is burning through their time, attention, and mental health?

    It is unlikely that we will collectively abandon social media. Any journalist or media scholar who insists on that as the solution will lose this generation entirely. But we should focus on the harder and slower process. That is not creating new journalistic content that bolsters news influencer culture or vertical video for the sake of fitting into a feed, but rather collectively dedicating ourselves to news literacy and carrying habits of skepticism, verification, and context into the platforms where people are already immersed.

    Ultimately, we have to decide if journalists are educators or communicators. If they are simply communicating information by any means possible to convey the message, they are communicators, and a devotion to vertical video is warranted. But if they are educators, then sharing information by a means that best preserves its fidelity (and that includes consideration of the public’s ability to receive it) becomes paramount. This is perhaps one of the most critical factors in determining the future of journalism.

    That work, however, will not feel as immediately rewarding as watching follower counts go up on a newsroom’s TikTok. It will feel, many days, like digging a path with a spoon. My fellow journalism professors likely have more than a few bent spoons in their desk drawers. Still, this is what true literacy requires.

    Young adults are the future of news because their habits will decide whether any form of accountable, verifiable reporting still has a place in public life. So when news organizations say we have to “meet people where they are,” we should be honest about what that sometimes means. In this case, it could very well mean building civic information into systems that we are collectively starting to realize are bad for us. And if we keep chasing attention by tapping the vein that keeps us scrolling, we shouldn’t be surprised when they look up and find ourselves in a zombie-like trance, mindlessly salivating and groaning through our daily doomscrolls.

    Meanwhile, the industry continues to chase a moving target. In meeting after meeting, we talk about news influencers, vertical video, and “engagement,” as if the only problem is that we haven’t yet cracked the content format that will finally unlock the algorithm. We change our strategy every time a platform tweaks a feature. We design whole campaigns around metrics such as watch time, shares, and followers.

    Our pursuit of engagement metrics ultimately leads us down a well-trodden pathway toward civic disengagement. Anecdotally, my students represent those social media audiences who feel overwhelmed, mistrustful, and too exhausted to do anything with what they’ve just consumed.

    This is where the whole enterprise starts to feel futile for those of us teaching journalism or trying to practice it locally. We know that trust in news is low, that civic engagement is fraying, and that communities feel unheard. So we build classes and partnerships and local reporting projects to address that. Then we’re faced with the confounding reality that the only way any of it will “reach” people is if we pour it into the same platforms that helped hollow out attention and trust in the first place.

    It is not realistic to expect young adults to collectively abandon social platforms. Nor is it responsible to withdraw journalism from spaces that are already saturated with misleading or false information. “Meeting people where they are” still has value. But we should take seriously the fact that many of them are telling us, in different ways, that they do not actually want to stay where they are and that they experience these environments as constraints on their agency rather than expressions of it. The point of a social media company is to keep us on the platform. The point of journalism is to give us enough understanding that we can act in the world off the platform.

    That means two things.

    First, in classrooms and communities, we need to confront this contradiction. When my students say they get their news exclusively from social media but don’t actually want it to be there, and that they increasingly no longer want to be on these platforms for mental and cognitive health, as a news scholar, I’m inclined to pay attention to what this means in terms of their relationship with information, and knowledge-based journalism, and the fact that they’re less obsessed with where they will be next congregating. Their capacity to congregate at all remains in deep need of repair.

    Social platforms are not neutral delivery systems but environments with their own logics and harms. Media literacy cannot stop at “how to fact-check a post.” It has to include the ability to recognize when an environment is degrading one’s own capacity to think clearly and when novelty and outrage are eroding the skills we claim to value in “informed citizens.” In my classroom, this has meant asking students not only where they get news but also how those spaces make it easier or harder to do the intellectual work necessary to function within society.

    Second, newsrooms and educators need permission to stop chasing every metric that platforms dangle in front of us. Judge our work by whether it deepens understanding, strengthens local connection, and leads to real-world engagement, not just “engagement” that registers as a like or follow. If we say that our goal is to support informed participation in public life, we must be willing to judge our work by outcomes beyond platform metrics and to routinely assess whether people feel more capable of following an issue or can distinguish between assertion and evidence.

    This matters for all of us, within the journalism industry and beyond, because the skills we ask of ourselves and the conditions we impose on ourselves are increasingly misaligned. To navigate public life, we need to be able to sustain attention, weigh evidence, follow a complex story over time, and tolerate ambiguity. The digital places we “live” in, increasingly and overwhelmingly, incentivize almost the opposite. Addressing this is a collective responsibility.

    Wafa Unus is an associate professor of journalism at Fitchburg State University.

    Associate Professor of Journalism at Fitchburg State University Wafa Unus, Ph.D. (Courtesy Wafa Unus)

    Wafa Unus

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  • President Trump is right to get tough on Maduro. What comes next is critical

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    The Venezuelan narco-state poses a clear threat to America’s security and prosperity. Two decades of socialism have destroyed this once wealthy country, spreading instability and transnational crime across the Western Hemisphere. After four years of appeasement under President Joe Biden, we cannot afford to ignore the problem any longer.  

    President Donald Trump is sending a clear and necessary message to the Maduro regime that its days of destabilizing the Western Hemisphere with impunity are over. Trump is putting drug traffickers around the world on notice. Let’s be clear: Venezuelan narco-terrorists and their drug shipments represent a threat to the American people. Trump has both the right and the responsibility to use military force to stop them.  

    In many ways, Trump’s approach is a continuation of the tough policies we pursued during my tenure as secretary of state under the first Trump administration. We recognized the dangers that this narco-trafficking dictatorship, aligned with American enemies like Iran, Cuba, China, and Russia, posed to our interests, and we were determined to do the necessary to protect the American people.  

    That’s why we initiated a pressure campaign to isolate the regime and raise the costs for Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro by crippling the country’s ability to export its biggest sources of revenue – cutting oil exports by 70% in just a few years. The Trump Justice Department indicted Maduro and his cronies on charges of narco-terrorism and drug trafficking, and the administration expanded its counter-narcotics operations targeting drug routes from Venezuela.

    TRUMP REWRITES NATIONAL SECURITY PLAYBOOK AS MASS MIGRATION OVERTAKES TERRORISM AS TOP US THREAT

    Soldiers of the Venezuelan army march with military vehicles during a parade as part of the Independence Day celebrations at Fuerte Tiuna in Caracas, Venezuela, on July 5, 2023. (Pedro Rances Mattey/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

    We also put our support firmly behind the Venezuelan democratic opposition: When Maduro stole the 2019 presidential election from pro-democracy opposition candidate Juan Guaidó, we took the bold step of recognizing Guaidó as the rightful president of Venezuela and led diplomatic efforts to galvanize other countries to follow suit.  

    Unfortunately, those policies were abandoned by the Biden administration, and American deterrence promptly collapsed. Sanctions were removed or eased, throwing the regime a lifeline and emboldening Maduro to steal yet another election in 2024. Alex Saab – the alleged bagman for Maduro and Iranian leader Ayatollah Khamenei, reportedly responsible for moving billions in money, gold and weapons between Venezuela and Iran – was released by the Biden administration as part of a prisoner swap in an act of rank appeasement that handed a major victory to the Maduro regime.  

    Meanwhile, the continued disintegration of the Venezuelan economy, combined with Biden’s de facto open border policy, brought hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan migrants to the United States, including notorious gangs like Tren de Aragua. Maduro even leveraged the migrant flow to extract concessions from the U.S. and secure his hold on power.

    DEMOCRATS ESCALATE WAR-CRIME ACCUSATIONS AS WHITE HOUSE CALLS ‘INNOCENT FISHERMAN’ THE NEW ‘MARYLAND MAN’ HOAX

    Thankfully, Trump is starting to get things back on track. In addition to the targeted strikes on drug traffickers and the military buildup in the Caribbean, the new administration has canceled the oil concessions granted under Biden, imposed secondary tariffs on countries that purchase oil from Venezuela, doubled the reward for Maduro’s arrest as leader of the Cartel de los Soles, and gone after the Tren de Aragua. As his Venezuela strategy continues to coalesce around a more confrontational approach, a few key principles should guide us.     

    The United States should be clear that Maduro is illegitimate and throw our support behind the democratic opposition movement led by Maria Corina Machado. Maduro has remained in power by stealing not one, but two elections, and has no popular legitimacy whatsoever. Genuine democratic reform, while by no means easy to achieve, is the only way that Venezuela will set itself up for success in the future and become a source of prosperity and partnership rather than violence and instability.

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    What’s more, we must understand that there can be no accommodation with Maduro’s regime, which threatens core American interests by destabilizing the entire region and exporting transnational crime to our shores. Accordingly, our strategy should use every available pressure point – including sanctions and kinetic actions where appropriate – to constrain the Venezuelan government’s ability to conduct business as usual. 

    Finally, we must remember that America’s adversaries want nothing more than for the U.S. to disengage in Latin America and elsewhere. While Venezuela’s collapse is causing even dedicated allies like China and Russia to take a step back, any situation in which the Maduro regime is able to stabilize will invite reengagement from the world’s worst actors and create an unacceptable threat extremely close to our borders.

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    Sanctions were removed or eased, throwing the regime a lifeline and emboldening Maduro to steal yet another election in 2024.

    As President Trump’s new National Security Strategy argues, it’s well past time we reasserted and enforced the Monroe Doctrine to protect American interests in the Western Hemisphere and prevent our adversaries from gaining the ability to project power in the Americas.  

    Venezuela’s collapse is yet another example of the inevitable endpoint of socialism: autocracy, economic disaster and spiraling instability. The longer the Maduro regime remains in place, the worse the situation will become for Venezuelans, neighboring countries in Latin America and for the entire Western Hemisphere. Our strategy must reflect that understanding and empower the administration to deploy every tool available to protect and advance American interests.  

    CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM MIKE POMPEO

    Mike Pompeo serves as a contributor at FOX News Channel. Previously, he served in the Trump administration as the sixth director of the Central Intelligence Agency and the 70th U.S. secretary of state. He formerly represented Kansas’ 4th Congressional District.

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  • Where is Trump’s concern for conditions in federal detention centers? (Letters)

    Trump administration’s concern for Colorado inmates contradicts actions

    Re: “DOJ investigating state’s prisons,” Dec. 9 news story

    I read with great interest that President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice is “investigating whether Colorado prisons are violating the constitutional rights of the state’s adult inmates and youth detainees through excessive force, inadequate medical care and nutrition …”

    I find it fascinating and ironic that this same DOJ has chronically overlooked similar issues in regard to the handling of the migrants who have been systematically grabbed without warrants, and imprisoned without due process in facilities that have been documented as being overpopulated, unsanitary, and with inadequate nutrition or medical care. I’ve only heard of a few, if any, interventions to undo these chronic civil rights violations.

    David Thomas, Denver

    Name-calling sign of the president’s immaturity

    Re: “Federal court denies latest request to leave prison,” Dec. 9 news story

    In the article, President Donald Trump refers to Colorado Gov. Jared Polis as a “sleazebag.” Trump seems to have numerous undesirable traits, but one of his favorites seems to be derogatory name-calling. He seems to have a less-than-complimentary name for anyone who is not loyal to him, anyone he disagrees with, such as journalists, etc. According to artificial intelligence, this form of name-calling is most prevalent among children, which seems to fall in line with his level of maturity, sophistication and intelligence!

    Steve Nash, Centennial

    The 11-2 Broncos are an underdog?

    Further proof that the NFL/Vegas betting has no respect for the Broncos. The Broncos currently own the number one seed in the AFC, have not lost at home this year, and are on a 10-game winning streak. Still, Denver is the underdog in next week’s home game against Green Bay.

    Leroy M. Martinez, Denver

    Senator’s tragic death reminds us to do good in our lives

    Re: “State Sen. Winter killed in I-25 crash,” Nov. 28 news story

    Life can change within a second. The entire trajectory of someone’s future can be altered in the blink of an eye. I would’ve never believed that the section of the highway, Interstate 25, I travel on so often, the one that blurs by in a moment, could ever be remembered as something so tragic. That highway is now a distressing symbol of how life is a gift and can be snatched away at any random moment.

    Recently, two accidents occurred on the northbound I-25 near Dry Creek. Faith Winter, a Colorado senator, was killed, and three others were injured. However, it is important to remember Sen. Winter not the way she passed but how she lived.

    Reporter Katie Langford reminded us about how Sen. Winter fought to make Colorado a better place her entire life. She strongly advocated for and brought paid family leave to the state of Colorado, passed an important transportation bill to improve roads and public transportation, and fought against workplace sexual harassment, making impactful changes wherever she went.

    Sen. Winter made history and brought positive changes to many Coloradans and she will be honored and remembered in our hearts for years to come.

    Life is so short and unpredictable. Those who realize the importance of living each day like it’s your last and doing good in the world never really pass away. They live in everyone’s hearts, and the memory of them lasts for a lifetime.

    Swatiswagatika Nayak, Castle Pines

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    To send a letter to the editor about this article, submit online or check out our guidelines for how to submit by email or mail.

    DP Opinion

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  • Letters: Fremont cricket field critics fear the unknown

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    Cricket field critics
    fear the unknown

    Re: “Neighbors up in arms over cricket field plans” (Page B1, Nov. 22).

    It was shocking to read that a few neighbors are opposed to having a cricket field in the proposed Palm Avenue Community Park in Fremont. The main fear is that flying cricket balls could injure a child or elderly person or damage homes or cars. Do baseballs ever fly out of the field and cause personal injury? Balls flying over to the street or neighborhood will be rare and can easily be prevented in the design and construction of the stadium.

    It is more likely the fear of the unknown. People here are not familiar with cricket. Both baseball and cricket trace their origins back to medieval European bat-and-ball games and are more like “cousins.” Cricket fields all over the world are in the middle of cities and residential neighborhoods, and they are safe. It is fun to play and or watch cricket, so let us go for it.

    Subru Bhat
    Union City

    Coal project is bad
    for Oakland’s health

    Re: “Coal project costs mounting” (Page A1, Nov. 26).

    The New York Times article about Phil Tagami’s proposed Oakland coal terminal is very misleading.

    The article says, “a state judge ruled in 2023 that the city had to uphold its deal with Tagami.” However, that ruling only provided Tagami with $320,000 in damages. The disappointed coal developers found a judge in Kentucky whose suggestion of hundreds of millions in damages was rejected by Kentucky’s district court on November 21.

    The article quotes Tagami as denying that the project “makes a difference in the world.” But several mile-long trains every day would be spewing unhealthy coal dust from Utah to Oakland. And when burned, that much coal would cost the world tens of billions of dollars in damages (using the EPA’s social cost of carbon).

    The article says, ”The coal project must now go forward.” Those of us who care about the livability of Oakland will continue to oppose this deadly project.

    Jack Fleck
    Oakland

    Mastering spelling
    unlocks many doors

    Re: “Spelling isn’t a subject we can afford to drop” (Page A6, Nov. 19).

    My attention was drawn to Abby McCloskey’s column.

    As this article asserts, a strong foundation in spelling in a child’s early learning years leads to reading and literacy proficiency down the road. My personal academic experience bears this out.

    In my elementary school years in the 1950s, I had a natural strength in spelling, which was nurtured by my teachers. I still have all of my certificates of achievement, which span local through regional spelling contests that I entered.

    Further, this skill led me toward my love of writing — whether it be in the form of a school essay, poetry or, as you are reading now, my penchant for submitting letters to the editor.

    While “spell check” is a helpful tool, our brains still rely on the visualization of words to connect the dots in our educational journey.

    Sharon Brown
    Walnut Creek

    Immigration judges’
    principles cost them

    As the season of gratitude, peace, joy and hope approaches, recently unbenched San Francisco Immigration Judges Patrick Savage, Amber George, Jeremiah Johnson, Shuting Chen and Louis Gordon have inspired this letter. Although no reason was given for their forced departures, I wasn’t surprised. Having seen several preside over mandatory immigration hearings restored my hope in this country’s future. Unfortunately, the very behaviors that gave me hope put them at risk of losing their jobs. Behaviors like being well-versed in immigration law, diligent in their efforts to fully understand cases from both immigrant and government perspectives, and exhibiting both kindness and respect to all present within their courtrooms.

    The current administration has rendered these judges easily disposable obstacles to any campaign promises conflicting with this nation’s laws, Constitution and system of checks and balances. Fortunately, obstacles like integrity and allegiance to oaths of office can’t be as easily disposed of.

    Linda Thorlakson
    Castro Valley

    Letters To The Editor

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  • DR MARC SIEGEL: How faith and gratitude can still work wonders in a fractured nation

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    At a time of great political division, we need common ground to bring us back together. Most of us believe in miracles. A recent Gallup poll revealed that three in four Americans identify with a specific religious faith – a majority as Christians, and nearly half say that faith is very important in their lives. We can use this to unite us as a country.

    When we learn that someone has miraculously survived a cardiac arrest — as NFL safety Damar Hamlin did on a football field in Cincinnati in 2023, or Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., did on a baseball field following a gunshot back in 2017 — the last thing we think about is whether they are a Democrat or a Republican.

    As I describe in my new book, “The Miracles Among Us,” in Rep. Scalise’s case, the doctors who performed the combined interventional radiological and surgical procedure to repair his badly torn iliac artery after transferring 50 units of transfused blood both said this was the most miraculous event of their careers. They also believe that Scalise’s “gratitude to God” played a direct role in his recovery.

    DR MARC SIEGEL: MY PERSONAL MIRACLE: A PHYSICIAN’S LESSONS IN FAITH AND HEALING

    Scalise told me, “I never felt fear. Once I put my life in God’s hands, an unbelievable calm and ease came over me. My mind went to a different place. Whatever was going to happen that day was up to God, and he got me through, and I felt Him throughout my recovery.”

    Several of the subjects in my book report that when experiencing a miracle, a calm comes over them knowing that their lives are in God’s hands. 

    House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., walks with his wife Jennifer from the House chamber to his office in the Capitol on his first day back in Congress on Thursday, Sept. 28, 2017. Scalise was shot during baseball practice for the Congressional Baseball Game in June 2017.

    Dr. Robert Montgomery, chief of surgery at NYU, experienced seven cardiac arrests before having a heart transplant. “In these experiences, I feel a connection to a vastness, a connection to something much bigger than my experiences on earth. I start becoming aware of my own breath, and at first, I’m not sure what the sound is. And just before the moment when all my thoughts and memories are coming back, I am conscious of transcendence that’s way beyond anything that’s human or of this planet Earth we are on. I feel calm and serene. I feel my soul right before I am in my body. As I am waking up there is this overlap of awareness of this vastness and then knowing that I am a living being.”

    Several of the subjects in my book report that when experiencing a miracle, a calm comes over them knowing that their lives are in God’s hands. 

    Montgomery says this experience helps him to be at peace with who he is, and has enabled him to be a far more effective doctor and surgeon. 

    Jordan Grafman, a neurophysiologist at Northwestern University, has recently discovered via functional MRI imaging and brain lesion mapping that belief in miracles relies on similar networks in the right side and the front part of the brain as partisan political belief does. Moreover, both politics and spirituality are experienced similarly and lead to a desire to be part of a common community — suggesting one can sometimes replace the other. 

    DAMAR HAMLIN SUFFERED CARDIAC ARREST DURING GAME, HEARTBEAT RESTORED ON FIELD, BILLS SAY

    Indeed, I do not believe a rigid separation of church and state is good for either patient care or for society. Why should a deeply religious physician leave his or her vestments or tallis at the door of the hospital or medical office? Why shouldn’t a pious physician pray with his or her patients the way that Congressman Scalise’s doctors did?

    Damar Hamlin in the hospital

    Damar Hamlin watching the Buffalo Bills from his hospital bed on January 9, 2023. (Credit: @HamlinIsland / SPORTS REPORT+ /TMX)

    Consider that the acknowledgment of a higher being who is in charge may lessen a person’s desire to fear or contest another. “Fear God, not your fellow man” is the lesson from both Scalise’s and Montgomery’s experiences. It is a common theme in many religions– and it can help to ease the anger that fuels our politics.

    My father, age 102, survived an emergency bowel and hip operation, a high output fistula, a month on a ventilator, and more than three years on dialysis because of love for my mother, age 100.

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    Last week he explained to me how he had lived so long: “When someone throws a punch, I duck,” he said.

    Dr. Marc Siegel and The Miracles Among Us book cover.

    Split of Dr. Marc Siegel and The Miracles Among Us book cover. (FNC)

    Praying for my patients means understanding that they are more than just bodies to be fixed — that they also have precious souls to be nurtured.

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    This is the secret to great doctoring, and it keeps me from writing off any of my patients too soon. In each case, there may still be one more miracle to be had.

    Belief in miracles is also a path forward towards mutual respect, regardless of political affiliation in today’s tortured and divided times.

    CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM DR. MARC SIEGEL

    Marc Siegel, M.D. is a professor of medicine and medical director of Doctor Radio at NYU Langone Medical Center. He is Fox News Channel’s senior medical analyst. His forthcoming book is “The Miracles Among Us: How God’s Grace Plays a Role in Healing” (Fox Books, November 18, 2025) and author of “COVID: The Politics of Fear and the Power of Science.” Follow him on X @drmarcsiegel.

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  • An ode to the mums of Stranger Things

    Stranger Things is a show about ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Aside from Eleven, the heroes of the show are a ragtag troop of tweens, teens and parents from the Midwest fighting off supernatural monsters. Amongst them are the mums, who, in my humble opinion, really deserve a special shout-out. Because not only are they taking on 9-foot-tall demogorgons, they’re also fighting battles on other fronts, too: they’re juggling hormonal teens, useless husbands (or ex-husbands) and a heavy dose of good old-fashioned 1980s small town America misogyny.

    Courtesy of Netflix

    Joyce Byers (Winona Ryder) is the most obvious example of a badass mum. Mother to Will and Jonathan, her life is already hard enough before the Upside Down starts leaking into Hawkins. She’s a single mum working long hours at a local store to provide for her sons. The boys’ father is decidedly useless – especially when Will goes missing and his only interest is the potential payout. Joyce becomes convinced that Will is speaking to her through the lights in their home and begins raging around her quaint little town demanding answers and help. She is, of course, dismissed as the slightly nutty single mum who failed. It’s a stereotype that the people of Hawkins are all too ready and willing to embrace.

    Image may contain Winona Ryder Finn Wolfhard Caleb McLaughlin Gaten Matarazzo Head Person Face and Photography

    Courtesy of Netflix

    Watching Joyce fight not only the supernatural forces threatening her family, but also the ignorance and judgement of her humdrum neighbours makes you want to throw a fist in the air and cheer her on. In season 1, she doggedly sets up Christmas lights and finds her son. Throughout the rest of the show, she’s continued to bring this steadfast, bulldog energy. She’s tiny, clumsy, and looks wholly unprepared for any battle. But, of course, as a mum, she throws herself in front of her boys without a second thought.

    Karen Wheeler (Cara Buono) is, in many ways, Joyce’s foil. The mother of Nancy, Mike and Holly, Karen is, in many ways, a stereotypical suburban housewife, complete with lazy, clued out husband, a million plates to juggle and a bit of an afternoon wine problem. She spends her blissful free time, of which there is not that much, soaking in a bubble bath with a dirty book or ogling the hot teen lifeguard at the local pool.

    Meg Walters

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  • Letters: Walnut Creek bike path plan doesn’t enhance safety

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    Bike-path gambit
    doesn’t enhance safety

    Re: “Safety debate at crossroads” (Page A1, Oct. 30).

    In a recent meeting held behind closed doors, Contra Costa County and the city of Walnut Creek agreed to use over $6 million in funds from programs designed to promote highway safety and improvements to carve out a three-block-long bicycle path on Treat Boulevard.

    The affected area runs from North Main St. to Jones Road, a stretch that currently handles over 40,000 vehicles a day. The proposed path duplicates the existing Canal Trail, which is dedicated to bikers and pedestrians, is located two blocks south of Treat Boulevard and connects directly to the Iron Horse Trail for access to the Pleasant Hill BART station.

    The city acknowledged both the high risk to bikers using the proposed paths and the negative impacts on traffic in this highly congested area. So, why is this project going forward?

    Larry McEwen
    Walnut Creek

    Opposing investment
    policy is out of step

    Re: “Ethical investment policy approved” (Page B1, Oct. 10).

    The Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) came out in opposition to an Alameda County Ethical Investment Policy at the Oct. 3 Board of Supervisors meeting. The supervisors passed the policy but delayed implementation.

    The majority of Jews present at that meeting were mobilized by Jewish Voice for Peace and supported the policy.

    A September Washington Post poll found that the majority of U.S. Jews do not support current Israeli policies. The JCRC’s position of opposing a pro-human rights policy is not a mainstream position, and it is not aligned with Jewish values.

    The JCRC accused Israel’s critics of antisemitism and expressed concern about Jewish safety. Associating Jews with the acts of a murderous regime makes Jews less safe. Jews are safer in a world that works for all, including Palestinians.

    We urge the supervisors to implement the Ethical Investment Policy as soon as possible.

    Cynthia Kaufman
    Oakland

    California must go its
    own way on health care

    Re: “Policyholders brace for price increases” (Page A1, Nov. 22).

    The recent story harkens back to a pre-ACA time when people went without insurance because of the high costs of insurance premiums. What we need for California is a Cal-Care for all solution. However, this year, a Cal-Care bill was sent to Gov. Gavin Newsom, and he vetoed it. The main reason is that the federal government is not willing to give money that is due to us, which messes with the state budget.

    Staying in the United States is not beneficial to California. In 2022, we gave $83 billion to the federal government, which ends up getting redistributed to other states. The California National Party is the only party that recognizes this and has universal health care (Cal-Care, or Medi-Cal for all) as part of its platform.

    Maya Ram
    Union City

    Constitution will halt
    third term for Trump

    Re: “Don’t think Trump won’t try for third term” (Page A6, Nov. 18).

    A letter writer opined that President Trump could seek a third term as president by being vice president on a ticket headed by JD Vance, and, after Vance won the presidency, Vance could, by prearrangement, resign, and Trump would become president.

    However, the 12th Amendment of the Constitution stipulates that one who is constitutionally ineligible to be president is also ineligible to be vice president, which would presumably prevent Trump from becoming president under this subterfuge.

    Trump could argue that the 22nd Amendment of the Constitution prohibits him only from being “elected” — but not actually serving — as president for a third term. But the Supreme Court would likely reject this subterfuge on grounds that it conflicts with the plain intent of the 22nd amendment to prevent a person from serving a third term as president through the electoral process, as Franklin Roosevelt did in the 1930s.

    Roderick Walston
    Orinda

    Don’t cancel comic;
    just move it

    Re: “Don’t cancel comic for having an opinion” (Page A8, Nov. 23).

    I am one of the people who have written to request that “Mallard Fillmore” be moved to the Opinion Page, since it is clearly political in nature. I’m not asking that it be censored or removed from the paper, just that it be recognized as political opinion.

    In the past few days, “Mallard Fillmore” has implied that the media only looks for bad things about Donald Trump and twists the truth, that liberals are stealing our tax dollars to support their own political party, and only care about disease in an election year, and the media is hypocritically misleading us about the destruction of the White House East Wing. Meanwhile, “Pickles” taught Nelson to say I love you to his grandma, and “Luann” adopted a puppy. Which of these is not like the other?

    Incidentally, “Doonesbury” is offering more-than-20-year-old strips. That’s not a fair balance.

    Sampson Van Zandt
    Walnut Creek

    Letters To The Editor

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  • Opinion | The Truth About the War in Sudan

    By

    Abdel Fattah al-Burhan

    Khartoum, Sudan

    Sudan is a country with a long memory: Our history stretches back to the biblical Kingdom of Kush, one of Africa’s greatest civilizations. The war now waged by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia is unlike anything we’ve ever faced. It is tearing the fabric of our society, uprooting millions, and placing the entire region at risk. Even so, Sudanese look to allies in the region and in Washington with hope. Sudan is fighting not only for its survival, but for a just peace that can only be achieved with the support of partners who recognize the truth of how the war began and what is required to end it.

    Copyright ©2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

    Abdel Fattah al-Burhan

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  • Prop. 50 likely to stay intact no matter the fate of Texas gerrymandering

    If anyone needed proof of how swiftly political change can arrive, this fall is probably Example A.

    Just observe the last month. First, California Gov. Gavin Newsom was riding high after passage of Proposition 50 and its changes in California congressional district lines made him the most successful national Democrat in countering a key initiative by President Trump.

    Barely a week later, Newsom’s former chief of staff was indicted on charges of political corruption and tax fraud and many began to write him off as a presidential candidate because of it.

    Not even a week after that, Newsom was back in the catbird seat after a federal appeals court in Texas threw out that state’s gerrymandered congressional district plan – which earlier provided the motive for the Newsom-sponsored Prop. 50. The U.S. Supreme Court days later temporarily reinstated the gerrymandered Texas lines.

    It now appears the Texas decision nixing the changes there may be reversed by the high court, even though it was written by a Trump-appointed judge. Meanwhile the California proposition figures to survive its own court challenges, filed by the state Republican Party and the U.S. Justice Department.

    That’s because Texas officials from Gov. Greg Abbott down were  open about their effort to concentrate Houston-area blacks into one district while giving five others to white Republicans. By contrast, there was little or no mention of race by either side in the Prop. 50 campaign, which was very explicitly motivated by pure politics.

    Newsom created Prop. 50 specifically to counter the Texas gerrymander, which unlike California’s changes in district lines, was not adopted by a vote of the people. No race issue ever arose here until Republicans claimed after Prop. 50’s resounding win that was what motivated it.

    Nothing says the U.S. Supreme Court has to give a final OK to either the Texas court decision or Prop. 50, but if it eventually tosses both gerrymanders, Newsom would still achieve his political goal of offsetting the Texas changes put in motion by a phone call from Trump to Abbott. If both efforts are eventually nixed, Newsom’s goal of regaining the prior balance after the Texas action would still have been reached.

    Said one election law professor the day of the Texas decision, “There are not many grounds for a legal challenge against Prop. 50 to succeed.”

    There remains a possibility that both Prop. 50 and the Texas court decision tossing that state’s gerrymander will stand up in the Supreme Court. If that happens, Newsom would have achieved far more than his goal of balancing the Texas gerrymander with an exchange of five new California Democratic seats for five new Texas GOP ones. In that case, Newsom would have given Democrats a net gain of five seats in the House of Representatives.

    If something like that couldn’t put Newsom in an early lead in the 2028 Democratic presidential sweepstakes, it’s hard to see what could. A net gain of five seats would likely give Democrats control of the House, where almost all new Trump initiatives might then die.

    No wonder Newsom gloating after the Texas court decision came down. In a post on X, he said, “Donald Trump and Greg Abbott played with fire, got burned, and democracy won.” For a moment.

    Thomas D. Elias

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  • Opinion | Israel Proves the Danger of an ‘Independent’ Justice System

    The Supreme Court could be enabling a criminal conspiracy to prosecute IDF reservists unjustly.

    Avi Bell

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  • Opinion | Why America Is a ‘Creedal Nation’

    Democracy is a powerful and dangerous force, as America and the European democracies are discovering. Elites on both sides of the Atlantic haven’t done a very good job of handling it.

    We have some anniversaries coming up next year that may help us. We have, of course, the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The same day is the bicentennial of the deaths of the two founders most responsible for that great document, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. The Declaration is vital to understanding who we are as Americans.

    Copyright ©2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

    Gordon S. Wood

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  • Letters: Alameda County should stop coddling criminals

    Submit your letter to the editor via this form. Read more Letters to the Editor.

    Alameda County should
    stop coddling criminals

    Re: “Accused killer appears in court” (Page A1, Nov. 19).

    In your report on the horrific killing of coach John Beam, Alameda County Chief Public Defender Brendon Woods argued that “Instead of more jail and prison, we should invest in more effective solutions, such as diversion, mentorship and violence interruption.”

    Letters To The Editor

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  • Opinion | End U.S. Energy Dependence

    The Trump administration’s renewed focus on securing critical minerals highlights an urgent truth, reinforced in “China Aims to Keep U.S. Military From Obtaining Its Rare Earths” (U.S. News, Nov. 12): America’s energy future depends on what we build and where we build it.

    For too long, we have relied on foreign sources for the rare-earth elements and advanced materials that power everything from electric grids and defense systems to the data centers fueling artificial intelligence. Even with the rare-earths deal Mr. Trump struck with China last month, more action is required to diversify supplies and strengthen domestic production as an essential step toward energy security.

    Copyright ©2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

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  • Opinion: Taunted for Being a Jew on the Day I Buried My Mother – Houston Press

    The sky in “sunny” San Diego was atypically cloudy as it drizzled on a family gathered last Friday to bury its 92-year-old matriarch in the southwestern city’s only stand-alone Jewish cemetery.

    The mourners wore mostly black and dark-colored dresses and suits. Their attire stood out against the gray heavens like silhouettes.

    The matriarch’s 15-year-old son had been buried there. The mortuary attendant placed a biodegradable urn in the excavated grave.

    After the rabbi finished the service, the rain began to fall heavier on the men’s yarmulkes, the traditional head-covering worn by orthodox Jews and often donned by secular Jews on religious and woeful occasions. Her other three sons and their children each tossed a handful of dirt and flowers over the urn.

    I became that matriarch’s middle son on the day my eldest brother died as the result of a car accident in 1972.

    My wife and I had taken our daughters, ages 12 and 13, out of Meyerland Middle School on Thursday so we could fly from Houston to southern California to attend the service and the memorial to be held last Sunday. The government shutdown made the trip all the more nerve-racking.

    When the Friday funeral was over, my wife and I decided to take our children to a Chick Fil-a for a comfort-food meal. They deserved it after spending two and half hours in the drizzle, sitting in silence as a rabbi spoke about the meaning of life, love, and death. They were exhausted from the trip and the growing line of adults whom they had never met but who each shared their condolences with the bewildered and weary teen and pre-teen.

    We entered the carline in our rented 2024 Jeep Compass. Our children, sitting in the back seat, placed their orders for chicken nuggets and fries. My wife ordered a wrap.

    “May I have a name for the order?” said the “team member.”

    It’s a phrase my children have heard countless times, when Chick Fil-a might be a Saturday night treat or an improvised dinner on that rare weekday evening when their parents are too busy to cook a proper dinner.

    “Jeremy,” I told her.

    Once we completed our order, we inched forward to the drive-through window where the team member asked for the “name on the order.”

    “Jeremy,” I told her.

    “This is an order for Joshua,” she explained.

    “I’m so sorry,” I offered. “But my name is Jeremy.”

    “But the order is correct,” she insisted. “Please take your car around and park. We’ll bring you your order when it’s ready.”

    After roughly 10 minutes had passed, all four of us remarked on how long it was taking to get our food. On the myriad occasions when we’ve patronized the brand, this never happens, we all thought.

    When the team member, yet a third person with whom we interacted that day, arrived at our car after the extended wait, I rolled down the window.

    “I have an order for Jew,” she said plainly.

    “I beg your pardon,” I queried.

    “It’s an order for Jew,” she repeated. “The order is correct. Do you want it or not?”

    It was in that moment that I realized I hadn’t taken my yarmulke off. I was also wearing a black suit and a white dress shirt. My apparel wasn’t unusual for a secular Jew like me attending a family funeral.

    But it occurred to me: Did I look like a Hasid? The black-clad and “black hat[ted]” orthodox Jews more likely seen on the streets of Williamsburg not far from where I used to live in New York City.

    On any other day, I would have politely but passionately addressed all three of them and insisted that they apologize to my family.

    But I couldn’t do that on the day I buried my mother.

    My children, wife, and I had no other choice but to endure the humiliation of their taunt — their refusal to say my name.

    For what must have been a window of 25 minutes, those team members had power over me and my family and they decided to use it like waiters and waitresses at a lunch counter in the Deep South of the 1950s.

    Yesterday, two days after my mother’s memorial and four days after her funeral, I called the Chick Fil-a corporate office to complain. Their anodyne, corporate answer was an offer of free food that arrived via email around 10 p.m. last night.

    I also succeeded in getting the restaurant’s manager on the phone, a reasonable person who took my complaint seriously. I sent him my credit card receipt and he confirmed that someone had written “Ju” (sic) on our order.

    “I don’t know how you get to ‘Ju’ from ‘Jeremy,’” he concurred. “Something went wrong here and we are terribly sorry.” He said he would get back to me as he investigated the incident and addressed the authors of the insult.

    As the girls ate their food, we talked about how we had just experienced something that our black and brown friends experience often daily. We talked about how our “white eligible” skin shields us from the indignities that so many members of our community must navigate.

    I’m not an observant Jew. My wife is a Gentile and my children, while aware of their paternal and maternal families’ origins, have never practiced Judaism.

    But on that day, the habits of grief — the black suit and the broad black yarmulke — had reduced me to a totem. Little did they know that I would rise up from my grief like a Golem.

    In a few weeks, my wife Tracie and I are heading back to San Diego, without the kids. We’ll spend the weekend with my two brothers as we sort through my mom’s apartment.

    The manager offered to have us in for a complimentary dinner. I declined his generosity. But I did suggest that he organize a meeting between me and the team members we interacted with that day. We’ll see what happens.

    In the meantime, a yahrzeit candle burns on our dining room table. May my mother’s memory be a blessing.  

    This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2025.

    Jeremy Parzen

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  • Family Recipe Box: Remedies for coughs ‘n colds

    Whatever sniffles and coughs come our way, Lord knows it’s not as bad as some of the deadly bugs that have plagued humanity since time immemorial, such as smallpox. Speaking of which, did you know there is a local hero in North Worcester County who probably saved hundreds of lives from this dread disease?

    Among the events worth celebrating in our country’s 250th year will be a local hero: Dr. Thaddeus Maccarty, Fitchburg’s first physician. This brave soul was appalled by the death toll of small pox — but intrigued by what was called “the Sutton method.” This practice meant inoculating the patient with the disease, and Dr. Maccarty travelled to a Great Barrington hospital and presented himself as both patient and doctor.

    He survived the disease, and returned to Fitchburg. There, a fearful populace was ready to tar and feather the young clinician, but fortunately, Dr. MacCarty was able to meet with Deacon Ebenezer Goodridge, a member of the “Committee of Safety.” According to Doris Kirkpatrick’s masterful “The City and the River,” because of MacCarty’s ability to explain the brand new idea of inoculation, and his “open and fearless frankness the doctor succeeded in quieting the Deacon’s suspicion and avoided a coat of tar.”

    By August 15, 1776, Fitchburg built a hospital for the care of people suffering from small pox and this hospital continued for several years and built a strong reputation. More than 800 residents from all the area towns came to the hospital where they were charged one pound, one shilling, or 10 days labor, or 10 bushels of corn for treatment.

    This was a hospital with security — there was a guard at the gate who made sure no one entered without paying, and no one left without a “certificate of cleanliness.” The full treatment ended with the patient receiving a bath in a solution of rum and vinegar.

    ‘There’s a cure for that’

    For most of human history, getting from zero to age two was a struggle, but it was only until 1802, and the Paris-based Hôpital des Enfants Malades, was there a hospital designed exclusively for children. The Brits soon followed suit, and the famous Great Ormond Street Hospital opened in London in 1855, the same year as Philadelphia’s “Children’s Hospital” opened in the US, the first in our country to do so.

    Children’s hospitals emerged out of volunteers’ efforts and were independent from other hospitals. If you were a member of the “undeserving poor,” you’d end up in a workhouse infirmary. Locally, Fitchburg’s beloved Burbank Hospital opened in 1901 with 16 beds atop Prospect Hill in the site known as Nichols Farm. By 1912, there was a children’s ward on-site. The tradition for hospitals treating children was to admit those with short-term, rather than long-term illness, for fear of contagion. Records do not reveal ingredients or medicines used for children at the hospital. However, during the late 19th century, the patent-medicine world was forever expanding.

    These well-trained nurses were ready to care for you at Burbank Hospital in Fitchburg in the earlier part of the 20th century. (COURTESY FITCHBURG HISTORICAL SOCIETY)

    A particularly noxious product became infamous: “Mrs. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup.” Touted as a medicine to help soothe an infant during teething pain, the bottle contained alcohol and morphine (unlabelled) and caused many infant deaths. The Prohibitionists took up these “medicines” and public protest created a fertile ground for legislation.

    Local suggestions

    Family Recipe Box put out the call across North Worcester County and the suggestions poured in: hint, if you don’t have lemons and honey in your pantry, consider yourself understocked.

    For sore throats: Several readers suggested: gargle frequently with salt water, as much salt as you can stand, as hot as you can stand.

    For ear aches: From Leominster, Donna Dap suggested “Put on a hat — your body heat is soothing,” while Rachel Rhada swears by putting garlic oil in your ears as it  “works every time!”

    For random ailments: Cramps — a heating pad, or soaking towels in hot water and laying over abdomen. Rachel Armington suggests: “for headaches or eyestrain: a few drops of peppermint oil on a folded tea towel that’s been run under warm/hot water and wrung damp. Just hold over the area until the towel cools.”

    For “the bug that’s going around”: Barb Boraski Vosburgh of Fitchburg urges all readers to consume “homemade chicken soup. My grandma, my mom, me, and now my daughter believes it is the best for colds, flu, etc.”

    Bring on the honey

    Rum has been the basis for curatives for centuries (and not just bathing in it). So has honey. But it’s the exotic spices that draw interest in the world of Ayurvedic and Holistic healing. Finally, after two weeks, I became higher functioning after the “back to school bug.” And so I decided to crank up my anti-oxidant and Vitamin C game. Couldn’t hurt, right?

    I did some experimenting, and came up with the following — this recipe makes enough to last in the fridge for about a week  — and I’ve been drinking this every day for the past two weeks. And washing my hands — a lot!

    G & T Shot

    INGREDIENTS:

    2 tsp ground ginger powder

    2 tsp ground turmeric powder

    1 tsp Fresh ground black pepper

    1/3 cup honey

    Juice of one lemon

    DIRECTIONS:

    Put a couple teaspoons of honey into your storage jar (I like a one-cup jam jar). Mix in your spices until you have a thick syrup. Add the lemon juice and honey, mix thoroughly. It’s really thick, and I used a small milk-frother. Store in the refrigerator, add 2 teaspoons of syrup into a cup, and pour in water that’s hot, but not hot enough for tea. This brings out the aroma. You can drink this hot, or let it cool.

    Notes: I like to make the Shot hot, but then let it cool in an Atlas jar, and then put the lid on and refrigerate. When it’s cold, shake it up vigorously — that’s your “G & T Shot.” Happy healing!

    Sally Cragin would love to read your family recipes and stories. Write to: sallycragin@gmail.com

    Sally Cragin is an award-winning writer/journalist and Fitchburg City Councilor-at-Large. (CHERYL CUDDAHY)
    Sally Cragin is an award-winning writer/journalist and Fitchburg City Councilor-at-Large. (CHERYL CUDDAHY)

    Sally Cragin

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  • Editorial: Despite building spurt, home ownership still remains elusive goal

    It’s a recurring, discouraging statistic that no aspiring first-time homebuyer wants to hear.

    Despite enduring some of the highest monthly expenses nationwide, only one in seven renter households in Greater Boston can afford an “entry level” home, according to the 2025 Greater Boston Housing Report Card released Wednesday.

    The share of renter households with the means to buy a starter home fell from 30% in 2021 to 15% in 2025, the report shows.

    That’s despite a period of increased housing construction activity.

    “While new data from the U.S. Census Bureau shows a significant uptick in new home completions in recent years, the increase has not significantly helped home affordability, and a decline in the number of new housing permits statewide suggests any construction uptick could be short-lived,” said Luc Schuster, executive director of the research arm of the Boston Foundation.

    The annual housing report found that Massachusetts created just under 98,000 housing units from April 2020 to July 2025, with about 71,000 in Greater Boston.

    The pace marks a “meaningful increase” and “would put Massachusetts within striking distance” of meeting the state’s goal of building 222,000 new units by 2035, the report stated.

    “But permits, which signal future housing construction, are way down,” the report states. “New permits as of July 2025 are running 44% below levels for the same period in 2021.”

    Despite the modest increase in housing construction, “Greater Boston’s housing affordability crisis has only worsened since the pandemic,” the report shows.

    In 2025, home prices and rents have broadly leveled off but remain at unaffordable levels, the data shows.

    Whereas in 2021, a household earning about $98,000 could buy a home at the low end of the market with a $2,520 monthly payment, a household this year would need to earn over $162,000 to afford the $4,200 monthly payment on the starter homes.

    While Greater Boston encompasses communities with the state’s highest housing costs, it’s not an insignificant sample.

    The Metropolitan Area Planning Council defines Greater Boston as an area made up of 101 communities — 22 cities and 79 towns — that includes a mix of coastal communities, older industrial centers, rural towns, and urban neighborhoods.

    And while housing costs do moderate somewhat beyond that region, so do the incomes of those who live there.

    And in many cases, incomes haven’t kept pace with housing prices, even in Gateway Cities.

    For example, since 2021, housing prices in Lawrence have climbed nearly 70% to a median of $500,000.

    Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll spoke on the report’s finding Wednesday, citing the administration’s work in passing the $5.2 billion Affordable Homes Act in 2024, and the MBTA Communities Law requiring zoning for multifamily housing in the 177 communities served by that transportation system.

    Despite the government’s efforts to spur housing construction, market forces — primarily the high cost of land and building materials — have conspired against it.

    As the lieutenant governor stated, building sufficient housing shouldn’t be this hard.

    But in Massachusetts, that’s the inescapable norm.

    DPU continues exemplary pipeline safety performance

    Building on the protocols incorporated in the wake of the catastrophic 2018 pipeline explosions in three Merrimack Valley communities, the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities has received another perfect score from the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration for its oversight safety program in 2024.

    On Sept. 13, 2018, a series of natural gas pipeline explosions in Lawrence, Andover and North Andover killed one man and injured dozens more.

    The explosions and fires occurred after high-pressure natural gas was released into a low-pressure gas distribution system, causing damage to more than 130 structures, and destroying five homes.

    Firefighters fought more than 80 blazes and thousands of people were evacuated from their homes.

    Columbia Gas of Massachusetts, the company held responsible for the disaster, pleaded guilty in federal court to pipeline safety law violations and negligence and agreed to pay a fine of $53 million.

    The events ultimately cost the company more than $1 billion.

    This evaluation marks the third consecutive year that the DPU’s Pipeline Safety Division has received a perfect score for the enforcement and implementation of federal pipeline safety standards.

    Through rigorous enforcement, the Division now ensures that the investor-owned gas utilities, municipal gas departments, steam distribution companies, and operators of intrastate Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) and Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) facilities comply with both state and federal safety laws.

    The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration regulates the safety of the transportation of energy and other hazardous materials. It must review annual progress reports, pipeline program procedures and records, and observe on-site inspections done by state safety regulators to adequately assess each state’s pipeline safety program when conducting evaluations.

    Since 2022, the Pipeline Safety Division has scored the maximum possible points for both portions of PHMSA’s evaluation.

    With legislative changes increasing penalties for gas operators that violate pipeline safety laws and regulations, the Pipeline Safety Division drove the reduction in damages through its enforcement, an increased field presence, and education.

    The series of safety reforms resulting from the 2018 pipeline disaster that tragically took one life should ensure that nothing approaching the scale of that cataclysmic event will ever occur again.

    Editorial

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  • Opinion | What Does ‘White Guilt’ Mean in 2025?

    Victim politics gave us pro-Hamas activism and a powerful reaction in the form of Donald Trump, argue Shelby Steele and his son, Eli.

    Tunku Varadarajan

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  • Opinion | Maduro Caused the Disaster

    Regarding Quico Toro’s essay “ Another U.S. Attempt to Topple Maduro Would Be a Disaster” (Review, Nov. 8): Venezuela’s economic collapse and migratory crisis began in 2013, at least four years before the U.S. imposed broad U.S. sanctions. From 2013 onward, Venezuela experienced the highest inflation rate in the world and a precipitous decline in gross domestic product, driven directly by the devastating economic policies of Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro, including widespread nationalizations, reckless monetary and fiscal policies and the implementation of universal price and currency controls.

    Mr. Toro neglects the consequences of the Biden administration’s policy of accommodation. Far from improving conditions, diplomatic passivity has allowed the government to dig in its heels, intensifying repression and exacerbating the humanitarian crisis.

    Copyright ©2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8

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  • Who was really to blame for the government shutdown?

    The U.S. government shutdown has finally come to an end after 43 days that resulted in thousands of flights being cancelled or delayed, food aid benefits for millions of Americans being jeopardized and hundreds of thousands of federal workers being furloughed. 

    But the question is: Which party bears responsibility for this shutdown? Let’s look at the facts as to who bears responsibility, not the misleading rhetoric.

    First, the shutdown’s genesis resulted from the Congress’ inability to timely pass the required 12 appropriations bills necessary to fund the government for the next fiscal year that began on October 1.  Neither party has been timely in passing a budget: 1997 was the last time that Congress passed a budget on time.

    Accordingly, on September 19, the House Republicans passed a continuing resolution to temporarily fund the government at current levels until November 21 to allow more time for budget negotiations.

    Senate Democrats, however, refused to support a bill that would have allowed the government to remain open during negotiations, instead conditioning their vote to keep the government open only if the “temporary” additional tax credits for Obamacare that had been enacted during the COVID pandemic were extended. 

    According to the Cato Institute, these “subsidies cover health insurance premiums for the roughly 7% of Americans who use the government-run Obamacare insurance marketplace.”  The Cato Institute estimates that approximately one-third of these enhanced subsidies went to people with incomes above 400% of the poverty level, or above $62,600 for a single person. 

    In short, in return for keeping the government open during budget negotiations, Senate Democrats insisted that Republicans first capitulate on an item that was part of those budget negotiations.  

    Moreover, extending these “temporary” subsidies for Obamacare was a significant budget item over which to condition keeping the government open. The Congressional Budget Office has recently estimated that permanently extending these enhanced COVID-19 subsidies for Obamacare would increase the U.S. budget deficit by $350 billion over the next 10 years. 

    According to the Economic Innovation Center, this additional cost is more than Congress would spend on either the FBI, the national parks service, NASA or the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over the next 10 years.

    More critically, even without the cost of these enhanced subsidies, the U.S. is already on track to run a deficit of $1.8 trillion this year and a public debt of 124% of its entire Gross National Product — which is higher than the debt immediately after World War II. 

    Millennials and Generation Z should understand that they will end up paying for this financial irresponsibility via future taxes, so they need to think carefully about supporting the extension of “temporary” subsidies for insurance policy enhancements that they do not need. More on that in a moment.

    In short, Senate Democrats’ insistence on continuing what were intended as temporary subsidies during a pandemic as a condition for reopening the government after the pandemic had ended is pure extortion, that is, it seeks to obtain an objective “by coercive means.” Senate Majority Leader John Thune even offered Senate Democrats a vote on extending the Obamacare subsidies as part of a deal to end the shutdown, which Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer rejected as insufficient. 

    However, on November 9, eight Senate Democrats ultimately agreed to end the filibuster in return for a vote on the tax credits in December. This deal has nonetheless been criticized by those who insisted on their way (enact the tax credits now) or the highway (a continued shutdown).  Among those who took the “my way or the highway” approach were House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Representative Ro Khanna and Gov. Gavin Newsom, who called the deal to end the pain from the shutdown “pathetic.”

    However, there is a more responsible route to address the rising cost of Obamacare premiums than extending temporary tax credits enacted because of the pandemic: Agree to the formation of a bipartisan commission of respected elder statesmen to propose measures to reduce the costs of Obamacare, which would be subject to an up-or-down vote. 

    Daniel Kolkey

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