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Letters to the editor

“40 acres and a mule” — Black reparation

Arthur Keller Beavertown Have you ever heard the story of the phrase “40 acres and a mule?” Although I enjoy history, I couldn’t recall this story. This was the first attempt to provide a form of reparations to newly freed slaves after the Civil War. Astonishingly radical, it called for the federal government to confiscate 400,000 acres of private property from Confederate landowners and methodically redistribute it to former black slaves. How did this all come about? General William T. Sherman and Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton met with 20 leaders of the black community, ...

Happy Birthday America

Robert Rodkey Julian This fledgling nation a mere 250 years ago has arisen to be the most powerful nation in the world, both militarily and economically. The United States of America is the economic engine that pulls the world’s economic train. The USA is the greatest country with the most freedoms of any land on the face of this planet. How can this be? Terry Prachett said, “If you don’t know where you came from, then you don’t know where you are, and if you don’t know where you are, then you don’t know where you are going.” The point being in relation to our ...

Another self-inflicted wound

Tim Mannello Williamsport Donald J. Trump’s war with Iran has already hurt ordinary Americans. Now his administration is floating another idea that would deliver yet another self-inflicted wound on all of us: shutting down customs inspections at sanctuary city airports. That move would hit even harder, and regular people would feel the impact first. The economic hit would slam everyday life. Local economies would slow almost overnight. Medicine, electronics, auto parts and fresh food would sit in warehouses instead of reaching stores. Hospitals would wait for supplies that ...

Mt. Carmel Twp.’s Data Center: Lessons for other communities

Tim Mannello Williamsport Communities throughout Pennsylvania worried about becoming a site for an AI data center can learn from Mount Carmel Township, where residents faced rapid proposals, limited information, and major environmental questions—showing how early awareness and strong local engagement can shape better outcomes. Many residents of Mount Carmel Township have been led to believe they have little power to oppose large data centers. Citing Pennsylvania’s newly passed House Bill 2151, which sets statewide standards, some developers claim local governments can no ...

Have we badly misunderstood the Bible’s relevance for today?

Kimball Shinkoskey Woods Cross Experts in the religious world believe the Ten Commandments are a moral code intended to guide the private lives of both Jewish and Christian believers. Have the experts ever been wrong before? Hmm . . . experts for a long time were certain that the earth was flat. Turns out, modern scholars have noted that the commandments exist in the form of an ancient international treaty document. This is a huge signal that the document is a treaty negotiated between two or more separate and independent political entities, like the very proud twelve individual ...

Clinton County on short end of PFBC’s stick

Jeff Deitrich Renovo When I was a kid, I remember taking my elderly uncle out fishing for stocked trout on Long Run near Salona. I remember my dad teaching me for the first time how to use a spinner for stocked trout on Baker Run. I remember as a 16-year-old fishing up through Paddy Run near Renovo and coming upon a stocking truck at the reservoir, where the lone driver and I stocked 400 trout into a quarter mile stretch of water. What fantastic days those were. They could not be that today. Those three streams are on a list of at least 15 Clinton County streams that once were ...