About 10 weeks ago, Gov. Josh Shapiro unveiled his 2026-27 state budget proposal. The budget is due June 30 — about 11 weeks away. As close to the mid-point as we are, we hope our lawmakers are making substantive progress on deciding what the state budget should look like. We can ...
A week ago, on front pages of both the weekend edition and the Monday edition of the Williamsport Sun-Gazette, we published stories about our history, as perhaps the launch of our observance of the United States’ 250th anniversary. It is difficult to affix a label or phrase that this ...
There is nothing quite like war to shine a light on a nation’s strengths — and weaknesses. Take the American war on Iran. The astonishing reach and dominance of US airpower is on display almost daily, as American (and Israeli) fighter jets strike Iranian military targets, manufacturing plants, and government leaders. (An American F-15E downed on Friday was the first US plane to be lost over Iran in the month-long campaign.) That they have significantly undermined Tehran’s military is unquestioned. And yet the limits of brute American force are also all too apparent, as two of ...
Gov. Josh Shapiro’s Healthy Moms, Vibrant Futures’ Maternal Health Strategic Action Plan sounds like a real step forward in helping expectant mothers in rural areas. Perhaps it’s unfair to expect a problem that has metastasized over the past two decades to be fixed quickly, but in our view Shapiro’s plan doesn’t seem likely to accomplish much in its first year. And that’s too bad, because there are hundreds of soon-to-be mothers in rural counties across our state who we think deserve better. The plan has several components, but given the closures of labor and delivery ...
As often as we’ve editorialized about the interconnectedness between affordable energy and the successes and opportunities American families may enjoy, world events unfortunately can bring that interconnectedness into sharper focus. An article in Thursday’s edition of the Williamsport Sun-Gazette in which an official with the Marcellus Shale Coalition demonstrated that. “Global instability is a stark reminder that energy security is national security,” Pat Henderson, vice president of communications and government affairs at the Marcellus Shale Coalition, said. “America, ...
The Trump administration has ruthlessly targeted diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs that classify Americans based on a progressive racial hierarchy. But the federal bureaucracy is vast, and the White House apparently didn’t catch them all. Hence a new lawsuit challenging a medical scholarship administered by the Department of Health and Human Services that bars applicants who don’t have Native Hawaiian ancestry. The lawsuit, filed Monday by the medical group “Do No Harm” and first reported here, argues that this racial requirement for a federal government benefit is ...
