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Congress should keep its promise to combat injured veterans

When Americans are injured in combat, we have a responsibility to make sure they receive the benefits they earned through their service and sacrifice. For tens of thousands of veterans, we are falling short of that promise. Under current law, many veterans who were forced to retire from the military because of combat-related injuries must give up a portion of their military retirement pay in order to receive disability compensation from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). The Major Richard Star Act would change that. The bipartisan legislation would correct what DAV and other ...

The oil market that sets today’s gas prices was invented in western PA

The fall of 2026 is a moment of energy centrality, when geopolitics unfolding far away shows up in Americans’ everyday lives. In Pennsylvania, the statewide diesel price averages US$6.50 per gallon. In Iowa, farmers are paying more than $6 a gallon for diesel. And in Alaska, unleaded gas runs more than $9 a gallon. As a distinguished professor of history and environmental studies at Penn State Altoona, I write widely about oil and energy issues. This moment has me thinking about how the oil industry began nearly 170 years ago in northwestern Pennsylvania. Setting crude prices ...

Dear Annie: Son’s free ride gets expensive

Dear Annie: My best friend of over 20 years has a son that is her world. Her entire life revolves around him. What I’ve noticed is that he has become such a master of manipulation that either she ignores it or she truly doesn’t see it. For example, he recently transferred colleges to accept an athletic scholarship. He insisted his car, a 2025 BMW, be delivered to him, for a delivery fee of $2,700. At first, she didn’t agree to it, but he pushed back so hard that she gave in. Then came over $1,000 in parking tickets — that SHE paid! He was supposed to pay them out of the ...

CPAP user is constantly awakened at night by a dry mouth

DEAR DR. ROACH: I am 74 and have sleep apnea. I’ve used a CPAP device for over 20 years. Over the past four to five years, I’ve been awakened several times each night with a seriously dry mouth. I will get a drink, use the bathroom, and get right back to sleep, only to have the same thing happen over and over again. I’ve used several different types of face masks with a full face mask working the best, and I’ve tried using a chin strap without success. This impacts my quality of sleep. I am otherwise in pretty good health and have an active life. — G.I. ANSWER: Dry mouth is ...

Take the Wilderness Road and you’ll find the Appalachian first lady who fooled Washington

WYTHEVILLE, Virginia — Most people meet this town zooming past it at 70 mph. Interstate 77 comes up out of North Carolina. Interstate 81 runs down the Great Valley toward Bristol. They cross here, share a few miles of pavement, and then split again. Truckers stop for diesel. Families stop for a bathroom. Then they are gone. They miss the better road. U.S. 11 runs right through downtown as Main Street. In this part of Virginia, it is also called the Lee Highway. Before that it was the Great Road, the wagon road that carried settlers south out of Pennsylvania and Maryland and down ...

The Greece speech

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 ...