Commentary
Insurance for natural disasters is failing homeowners
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. The wildfires that have devastated large parts of Los Angeles County have drawn fresh attention to the struggles many Americans face insuring their homes. Since 2022, seven of the 12 largest insurance companies have stopped issuing new policies to […]
Trump is not the first U.S. politician with designs on Canada
Donald Trump says he wants Canada as our 51st state. But he’s not the first American politician who’s yearned to unfurl the Stars and Stripes over our northern neighbor. Two centuries ago, Henry Clay, Kentucky’s greatest statesman, was gung ho for invading Canada, then a British possession.?? “It is hard to escape the belief that […]
Americans’ rage at insurers goes beyond health coverage
This commentary is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. My book “Delay, Deny, Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It” was thrust into the spotlight recently, after UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot and killed in what authorities say was a […]
Why does Kentucky GOP leadership fear public debate and scrutiny?
After Republican legislators voted overwhelmingly for rules changes on the first day of the 2025 General Assembly to make it easier for their supermajority to end floor debates and rush to a final vote on controversial bills, Senate President Robert Stivers pronounced with aplomb that reporters in the chamber would focus on the debate happening […]
No place in Kentucky for the abomination that is conversion therapy
In the modern political climate, culture war battles are a dime a dozen. Whether it’s immigration or school choice or transgender bathrooms, the average voter can easily get lost in the sea of discontent that has become our politics.? Given this state of things, it is impossible for anyone to keep up with every single […]
Jimmy Carter and Kentucky
The political life of Jimmy Carter had several threads in Kentucky, which in turn influenced the state’s political and economic life. Perhaps the first major law Carter signed as president, and one that hasn’t been mentioned in any of his many obituaries I’ve read, was the 1977 Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act. It ended […]
It’s time to turn outrage into change: We need a better system to pay for health care
The fatal shooting of a health insurance company executive has exposed the deep dissatisfaction many Americans experience with their health insurance. Social media is abuzz with stories of anger and frustration with a system that prioritizes profit over people.? As a retired physician, I saw the shortcomings of our system regularly fail my patients and […]
Shore up social studies education to shore up American democracy
Several years ago the National Assessment of Educational Progress released a frightening report on the state of social studies education in America: As of 2018 just 24% of eighth-grade students were proficient or advanced in civics. History had even worse results with only 15% of eighth- graders assessed as proficient or advanced. The reasons for […]
Kentuckian made ‘pilgrimage’ to Plains, says honor Jimmy Carter’s memory by loving humanity
In the summer of 2019, I embarked on a pilgrimage to attend Jimmy Carter’s Sunday school class at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, Georgia. As a long-time admirer of Carter for his faith and service leadership, participating in his class was a big must-do on my bucket list. Due to his age, opportunities to soak […]
For enslaved people, the holiday season was a time for revelry – and a brief window to fight?back
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. During the era of slavery in the Americas, enslaved men, women and children also enjoyed the holidays. Slave owners usually gave them bigger portions of food, gifted them alcohol and provided extra days of rest. Those gestures, however, were […]
Palmer’s House of Toys: A Kentucky Christmas memory
At 17 I was the Santa Claus for the Walkertown section of Hazard. Rick Rosanova, the news guy at Channel 4, was Santa at the new Sears in the old bowling alley in another part of town, Lothair. And Bill Douglas was the city’s main Santa from Backwoods to Big Bottom. He had a $1,000 […]
Al Cross’ annual ‘gift’ guide for Kentucky’s politically prominent
FRANKFORT — Ed Ryan wasn’t the first political commentator to “give Christmas gifts” to political figures, but he and his successors as Courier-Journal Frankfort bureau chief, Bob Garrett and Tom Loftus, affirmed it as a tradition that I’ve been happy to continue for 25 of its 44 years. It may seem like an anachronism at […]