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State’s maternal care plan proves underwhelming

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 units ...

Artemis II mission offers inspiring unity for deeply divided nation

National confidence, unfortunately, is in short supply these days. In this season of springtime renewal, Americans would do well to look up – literally. Artemis II, NASA’s first meaningful manned space mission in over a half-century, has taken the nation by storm this month. In so doing, it has provided a timely reminder of what a great nation, acting with confidence and clarity of purpose, can still achieve. Public polling confirms that Americans are a largely pessimistic lot. Our politics are fractured, our institutions mistrusted, and our birth and marriage rates have plummeted. ...

There’s No Amazon Prime overnight delivery for war

In a world tied inextricably to social media, there's something deeply and spectacularly unserious about the way modern commentators talk about war. Anyone who has scrolled through online platforms following the outbreak of war with Iran will find the same childish questions of why the war isn't over yet, as if military conflict is supposed to function like an Amazon Prime delivery -- putting in an order from your couch and waking up to find it gift-wrapped on your doorstep the following day. Sorry, but this is all a fundamental misunderstanding of reality. War is not a ...

Natural gas remains important part of economic puzzle

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, ...

Compliance with rules a worthy goal

Logan Township isn’t alone in having been remiss about enforcement of some local ordinances. Not enforcing some of such laws — or not enforcing them to the fullest extent intended when the laws were enacted — is much more common in Pennsylvania and elsewhere across the nation than most people can imagine. However, an appropriate question remains consistent: Why have laws on the books if they’re not going to be enforced? Still, as Logan officials have pointed out, it’s appropriate that the goal be compliance, not burdening residents and others with fines. An overly ...

Congressman’s efforts on banking insurance appreciated

We applaud U.S. Rep. Dan Meuser’s efforts to adjust the perimeters for Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. coverage of Americans’ bank deposits. Regardless of the sources and contributing factors — and we suspect both the far left’s scapegoating of “greedy corporations” and the far right’s insistance that “government spending” was the primary culprit are largely wrong — the impact of inflation and rising costs of living deserved careful, detail-oriented responses by our elected officials. We’ve, in fact, repeatedly called on officials in both Washington and ...