Category: Editorial

  • Issue:

    As midterm vote nears, take it down a notch

    As this issue goes to press, the national news is focused on the bitter battle over a Supreme Court nomination. We’re in a week of limbo between the dramatic testimony of Christine Blasey Ford and Brett Kavanaugh and the completion of a highly anticipated but limited FBI investigation into the allegations against Kavanaugh. Even by read more

    As midterm vote nears, take it down a notch
  • Issue:

    State’s claims on cancer belied by new PFOA study

    When Michael Hickey, a former village trustee in Hoosick Falls, decided to have his tap water tested for perfluorooctanoic acid in 2014, he was searching for an explanation for what he and others believed was a high local incidence of cancer. Hickey’s father, who had worked at a local factory that used PFOA, died of read more

    State’s claims on cancer belied by new PFOA study
  • Issue:

    Tales from the trail: Haze and some light

    The general election season is suddenly upon us, at least in the two hotly contested U.S. House districts in our region of eastern New York. With the crowded Democratic primaries settled, the month of July brought the first chances for the two district’s incumbent Republicans to engage with their newly anointed challengers. We should all read more

    Tales from the trail: Haze and some light
  • Issue:

    To fix immigration, try making it easier

    On June 20, President Trump changed course, in the face of a growing public outcry, and signed an executive order halting his administration’s policy of separating children and parents when families are detained crossing the U.S. border. By then, the government had shipped off more than 2,000 children, even infants and toddlers, to holding facilities read more

    To fix immigration, try making it easier
  • Issue:

    Who’ll win in the fall? It depends who votes

    There’s been a lot written over the past year about the “enthusiasm gap” between Democratic and Republican voters in the age of Trump. In a series of special elections around the country, and in statewide contests last year in Virginia and New Jersey, Democratic voters have turned out in force, and the party’s candidates have read more

    Who’ll win in the fall? It depends who votes
  • Issue:

    Plan for Berkshires train falls far short of need

    By next summer, the dream of direct train service from New York City to the Berkshires could finally be realized — but only barely. Over the past dozen years or more, we’ve reported periodically on efforts to restore southern Berkshire County’s long-lost rail link to New York. For most of that time, the goal of read more

    Plan for Berkshires train falls far short of need
  • Issue:

    Anti-immigration rhetoric meets empty-job reality

    More and more in our new era of polarization, our leaders seem unable to set aside their politics and ideology to face and solve obvious problems. And nowhere is this trend more visible than on any issue that touches on immigration. Our cover story this month describes the struggles of area employers who’ve come to read more

    Anti-immigration rhetoric meets empty-job reality
  • Issue:

    Are the pundits wrong about Elise Stefanik?

    Among the professionals who monitor Washington politics, everyone seems to agree that freshman Republican U.S. Rep. John Faso of the Hudson Valley is one of the most endangered incumbents in the nation. In this year’s hotly contested midterm elections, control of the U.S. House could be at stake. Democrats need a net gain of 24 read more

    Are the pundits wrong about Elise Stefanik?
  • Issue:

    A county’s top leaders under separate clouds

    As this issue goes to press, it appears that the people of Rensselaer County will head into the new year with two of their top elected officials under separate legal and ethical clouds. First there was the news on Nov. 29 that a bipartisan ethics panel had admonished Assemblyman Steve McLaughlin, who just narrowly won read more

    A county’s top leaders under separate clouds
  • Issue:

    To save the museum, call off the auction

    As this issue goes to press, the Berkshire Museum is in court defending its plan to sell off 40 works of art from its collection, beginning with a series of auctions scheduled this month at Sotheby’s in Manhattan. The museum’s opponents in this legal tussle, including three sons of Norman Rockwell and lawyers from the read more

    To save the museum, call off the auction