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In sex assault cases, don’t let prosecution become mob rule

Editorials

“That it is better 100 guilty persons should escape, than that one innocent person should suffer.” — Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) The hardest decision a government prosecutor may ever face is also one of the most important tests of the rule of law: What do you do when you believe a crime occurred, and you believe you know who committed it, but you do not believe you can prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and to a moral certainty? The temptation is obvious. A prosecutor is a public official. The alleged victim wants justice. The public demands accountability. The alleged ...

Columbiana keeps building on its successes

Guest columnists

Several years ago, I began visiting relatives who moved to Apex, N.C. It didn’t take many visits to realize Apex is something special. Walkability. New housing starts. Quaint retail. A robust park system. A historically preserved downtown. A noticeable amount of infill where, during a difficult past, many houses were torn down. So I did some digging. Sure enough, publications like Money magazine consistently rank Apex as one of the best places to live due to its balance of rapid modern growth and small-town historic charm. In 1990, Apex had 5,000 residents. Today, it has ...

MAGA masculinity: Protesting too much

Editorials

We’ve seen Robert F. Kennedy Jr. lifting weights in snug Levis, sweat pouring down his naked muscled chest. Last February, the secretary of health and human services was “giving body” in the “Rock Out Workout” video. A jeans-clad Kennedy flexes alongside Kid Rock in black shorts, then strips off his shirt and joins Rock in a grotto-like pool. Provocative questions followed. Kennedy has become a hero to a MAGA movement that celebrates masculinity and pushes back against what it sees, not without reason, as an anti-male attitude flooding far-left feminism. I’m not the first ...

Hail Marco as classic orator

Editorials

Back in my college days (American University, Washington, D.C.), required reading included the works of Greek playwrights Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. Long after graduation they remained on my bookshelf. It was believed for generations that these men, along with philosophers Plato, Cicero and other great minds, could teach us. At too many of today’s colleges and universities we find courses in LGBTQ+ history and, according to Campus Reform, a 2023 course at Harvard “aimed to teach students how to prepare for a diversity, equity, and inclusion-filled future.” Harvard is not ...

Vote responsibly on local issues in our Valley

Editorials

Leaders of local governments and public school districts in the Mahoning Valley are to be applauded for accurately reading the room of their 2026 electorate. That keen perception is clearly evident in the relative dearth of additional tax levies those leaders have deigned to place on this fall’s general election ballots. Of nearly 40 issues up for a vote this cycle in Mahoning and Trumbull counties, only six seek new money from taxpayers. The electorate in Mahoning County will face a meager four additional operating levies, while only two such issues are on Trumbull ballots. Of those ...

Those who shout ‘genocide’ loudest are hypocrites

Editorials

On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas killers slaughtered 1,200 people, more than two-thirds of them civilians, inside Israel. For the ensuing three weeks, they refused Israel’s demands to turn over the 251 hostages and to surrender the architects of the massacre. No matter — within a day of the attacks, when Hamas gunmen were still fighting Israeli troops on Israeli soil, the American Left was already screaming “Genocide!” What was most surreal about the charges of “genocide” against Israel was that they so often came from elite first- and second-generation Middle Eastern immigrants to ...