To the Editor:

Politics Trumps responsibility.

I apologize to readers for the terrible pun, but I could not help myself. In recent days, we have heard much criticism from all over the political spectrum of President Biden’s recent executive order concerning capping the number of daily asylum seekers accepted at our border.  

To the Editor:

Recently Donald Trump spoke at the NRA convention and promised to roll back gun control measures enacted under Biden and fire the head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

By Paul Strop • Guest Columnist

I read with interest a recent letter expressing concerns about immigration, truly one of the main problems of this nation and the whole world. I wish to express an alternate view citing, if possible, where I obtained my information. 

The writer seems to believe the Donald Trump propaganda that undocumented immigrants (the writer uses the term “illegal immigrants”) are a financial burden to this country. However, studies from 2005 have documented the “illegal immigrants” pay about $7 billion per year into Social Security (N.Y. Times, April 2005). They will never collect a dime, but the writer will benefit from those dollars.

I recently saw people interviewed at the CPAC meeting stating how pleased they were with Trump’s accomplishments. That got me to thinking that maybe Trump’s most impressive accomplishment is gaslighting people into thinking that his pronouncements of achievements are real. Let’s take a look at the actual accomplishments.

Sandy Hook Elementary School, Newtown, Connecticut. Twenty-eight dead. Virginia Tech University, Blacksburg, Virginia. Thirty-three dead. Stoneman Douglass High School, Parkland, Florida. Seventeen dead. Harvest Music Festival, Las Vegas, Nevada. Fifty-nine dead.

By Norm Hoffman • Guest Columnist

Now we have yet another federal government shutdown. We have to ask if there ever was a government shutdown that Rep. Mark Meadows did not like or have a possible hand in making happen.

By Autumn Woodward • Guest Columnist

The Irish morning was cool. I’d tumbled over a stone wall into the park to go walking. Under two lines of ancient beech trees a peculiar, crooked figure dressed all in black was moving down the path. Overtaking it (it wasn’t moving fast), I peered sideways. The figure stopped.

As House Republicans scramble to address the ongoing family separation issue on the nation’s southern border, several competing bills have emerged, including one filed by Congressman Mark Meadows, R-Asheville, June 19. 

The three Cherokee tribes joined voices last week to decry the recent surge of family separations at the U.S.-Mexico border. 

For the past two centuries, local historians and writers in England have produced a large number of municipal and county histories, a project formalized in 1899 with the Victoria County History project, a massive undertaking that, more than 100 years later, is still unfinished. These detailed records have proven invaluable for historians and biographers writing on a grander scale, allowing them to compile data and statistics on topics ranging from deaths attributed to the plague to the impact of railroad revenues and services on country life.