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Emerging technologies fuel growth
THE WORLD’S AUTOMOTIVE industry is pivoting to electric vehicles at breakneck speed to meet new emissions requirements and rushing to establish the vast infrastructure from battery factories to charging networks, needed to sustain the growing market.
There is a fervor for
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What is a free and fair election?
ELECTIONS ARE THE essence of democracy. They allow people to select their political leaders and then, to hold them accountable. Standards must be set to define what is ideal. Most countries meet those standards imperfectly. Thus, the devil is in the details.
A free election is
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Behold, no one is getting younger
AS WE GET older, it’s remarkable how many crises we have lived through that we were too innocent to recognize at the time. Anxiety begins with the power to grasp and comprehend what is obscure.
Want to be obsolete without anxiety? Just
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Could crypto tokens get outlawed?
DO YOU UNDERSTAND the fascination and legitimacy given to bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies? I would be very suspicious about something most people don’t understand because cryptos are volatile and speculative.
Bitcoins are
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Our frustration has taken many forms
HAS THE PAST year of the COVID-19 pandemic and the related civil unease got you frustrated? Have events caused mood changes, irritation, resentment, depression or feelings of exasperation?
You’re not alone. The past year has disrupted the lives and
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Irish honoree’s tenets for success
THE LATE ROBERT Gallagher once said “A true leader is a student of people. Each individual has his own different temperament. Handling this requires study, tact and knowledge. No one size fits all in handling people.”
Gallagher’s distinguished career earned him many honors by
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Some challenges are cleverly disguised
WHAT WOULD OUR lives be like without challenges? A person’s greatest strength develops at the point where they overcome their greatest weakness.
What we do when confronted with these challenges has a lot to do with how we perceive our place in the world. We can face the challenges or we can
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Seniors: green before green was hip
IT’S NO SURPRISE the world is changing in this era of social media. There’s Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google and Apple. There is a striking disconnect from generation to generation. Here’s an example of “The Green Thing.”
In the grocery store checkout line, before the pandemic, the
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Why so much dislike for Americans?
AS THE WORLD has grown smaller, more volatile and unstable, how the United States is perceived by the rest of the world has taken on new importance.
With about 330 million people, the United States represents
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Wise counsel from past presidents
THEODORE ROOSEVELT SAID “This country will not be a good place for any of us to live in if it is not a reasonably good place for all of us to live in.”
Presidents Day, which we celebrated Feb. 15, officially honors the birthday of George Washington, which is Feb. 22. But the holiday also commemorates all past presidents of the United States including
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There is no limit to aging humor
I’M AT THAT age where my mind still thinks I’m 29, my humor suggests I’m 45, while my body mostly keeps asking if I’m not dead yet. Old friend Arnie DeLuca said “There is no limit to aging humor.” He sent me this list of interesting and perhaps true thoughts on our now older age.
For example, you don’t realize how old you are until
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What’s the limit for believability?
ARE YOU THE type of person who sees a sign that says “Don’t touch this bench, the paint is wet,” and you go ahead and touch it to make sure the paint is really wet?
Maybe you are inclined to
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How to live a happier financial life
DID YOU KNOW that the average 65-year-old American will live an additional 19.3 years? One in four will reach age 92, according to the National Center for Health. That can be good news for some people and bad news for others. Are you financially prepared to live to age 85?
Six years ago, Jonathan Clements, a financial columnist for the Wall Street Journal, thought back over his career and
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Penn sees path for agreement, unity
AS THE COUNTRY prepares for the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris administration to take over the leadership of our government this week, it’s interesting to note what Mark Penn had to say about the disposition of the American people. We need to support the new government and be open to new ideas if we are to unite for
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Student debt plans face scrutiny
ARE YOU ONE of the 43 million Americans saddled with student-loan debt? Maybe you owe $40,000 and your financial situation is such that you struggle just to pay the interest on the loan. In fact, you have other loans to pay and the burden is overwhelming.
Now, let’s say the Joe Biden administration is
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We need uniform voting standards
THE USE OF absentee ballots exploded during the pandemic. Does this foretell how we’re going to see state and national elections play out in the future? Should we expect this phenomenon to happen again in 2022 and ’24?
More than
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Promises to keep for a special 2021
IT’S THAT TIME of year again to make your New Year’s resolutions. For those seeking a challenge, here are a few goals to set for yourself. Start 2021 by promising yourself:
• To be strong, so that
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O. Henry’s classic Christmas love story
IT WAS CHRISTMAS Eve day and poor Della Young counted her money. She had just $1.87 to buy her beloved husband a Christmas present. Much of the money consisted of pennies she had scrimped and saved for months by skillfully dickering with the grocer, butcher and vegetable man. But it would clearly not be enough. Della was
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Adults are lucky, teens get no help
ADOLESCENCE IS A mental illness when it happens to anybody but a teenager. In a 30-year-old, for instance, a state of adolescence is called a nervous breakdown. This was an observation made in 1982, by Bob Myers, the eccentric owner of The County Press in Lapeer, Mich. Myers wrote a column under the pen name of
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Biden: unite, pull together to heal
IT HAS NOW been five weeks since the presidential election. Time to reflect and put things into perspective. Whether your candidates won or not, we should all want the new Joe Biden administration and our country in general to succeed. We need to believe the sun will shine again in America.
President-elect Biden has
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Ready or not, I’m a septuagenarian
THERE COMES A time in everyone’s life when you know all the answers, but nobody asks you the questions. I pulled off my 70th birthday Dec. 1. The crossing of that milestone was almost effortless and went amazingly fast. And as many birthdays prior to this one, it was basically uneventful.
What do you consider milestone birthdays in your life? Was it 16, 21, 30, 50 or 65? Maybe it
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Giving thanks alters our behavior
SHOW YOUR GRATITUDE this Thanksgiving. Researchers say it is good for your health. Expressing gratitude improves cardiovascular strength, sleep quality and more, according to Robert Emmons, a psychologist at the University of California, Davis.
“Gratitude enhances performance in
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How do we tackle income inequality?
INCOME INEQUALITY CONTINUES to grow in many countries including 20 out of 29 advanced economies. Wealth is significantly more unevenly distributed than income worldwide. This has many people very concerned for the future of America.
Recent events have reminded us that
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Veterans of all ideals defend our values
THIS VETERANS DAY, we reflect on the sacrifices made by those who volunteered to defend the United States. But let’s also find time to consider that these sacrifices were undertaken to defend values that our “ruling class in waiting” seeks to undermine.
Many students at elite colleges don’t
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Family caregivers are unsung heroes
MORE THAN 90 MILLION Americans improve the quality of life for loved ones who have chronic conditions, disabilities, disease or the frailties of old age. They are our country’s unsung heroes. November is National Family Caregivers Month. Of family caregivers, 60% work full or part time.
Caregivers can be
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Will election mollify chaotic 2020?
WHO WON’T BE relieved when this general election cycle is over? The year 2020 has been one for the history books. We all need some closure as our bitterly divided country braces for the Nov. 3 election. It’s critical for the survival of democracy that we trust the results.
If 2020 has taught us anything, it is
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A class divided, lessons learned
GOD CREATED ONE race: the human race. Humans created racism. Because of that, celebrated educator Jane Elliott concluded that racism can be fixed. She has spent more than 50 years adapting the now famous “blue eyes/brown eyes exercise.”
As a school teacher in the small town of
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No surprise; an election in crisis
WE MUST TAKE all measures possible to ensure the integrity of our elections. Nov. 3 has been called one of the most important presidential elections in our nation’s recent history.
What a shame it would be if
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Jim Lehrer’s ‘Rules of Journalism’
THIS WEEK, OCT. 4-10, is National Newspaper Week and it’s being celebrated for the 80th time. Famed journalist Jim Lehrer died earlier this year, Jan. 23, at the age of 85. Following are a select few of the rules Lehrer thought were important:
• Cover, write and present every story with
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Over time, the tides rise and fall
WINDS CHANGE, TIDES rise and fall, political fortunes have a lot to do with momentum. You can be on top one day and on the bottom the next. In just a few weeks, an estimated 150 million Americans will vote in the most important national election in history. Some will vote in-person, some via absentee ballot and others by
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A battle for peace, harmony, wisdom
THIS STORY IS a popular legend of unknown origin often attributed to the Cherokee people. The story, “Two Wolves,” is used to explain the inner conflicts we have between our good and bad thoughts.
One evening, an old Cherokee told his grandson about a
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Gloomy news causes stress disorder
MAYBE IT’S TIME for us to step back from all the news that gives us fits. Do we really need news from social media sources every hour of every day? Do we need messages and alerts arriving on our computers and phones every minute?
To let tomorrow’s worries overwhelm today’s joys is
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Let’s all meet in the town square
ARE YOU AFRAID voting problems in November will create chaos and be a disaster for our confidence in democracy? Questions have been raised by leaders of both major parties, and the potential for fraud and logistical problems is a legitimate concern.
First, we should
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Core values undergoing challenges
THE CIVIL EXCHANGE of ideas is under attack. Opinions are met with hostility and resistance. Divisive issues confound us. Frustrated people are intent on maximum disruption. These are crazy times.
It’s hard to believe a majority of people, whether
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‘Lady Luck’ doesn’t make you successful
THE LATE PIANIST and actor Oscar Levant once said “Happiness isn’t something you experience; it is something you remember.” But what is real happiness? In just a few minutes, I’ll share with you a story that uses coffee as an analogy to tell you the simplicity of life.
But first, Frayda Levin, a
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Wimpy’s character ahead of his time
BACK IN 1932, J. Wellington Wimpy of Popeye fame made the now famous offer “I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday, for a hamburger today.” Wimpy was slightly ahead of his time.
If Mr. Wimpy was to make that offer today, it might be “I’ll
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The journey, not the destination
WHAT IF YOU could see into the future and preview your life for the next five years? Would you really want to know what’s going to happen to you and your family in advance?
Before you say yes, ask yourself if
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What is wrong with skinny people?
I HAD AN interesting discussion with a young friend the other day as we observed a steady flow of people walking past our table at the local diner. That reminded me of an old essay tucked away in my files.
A majority of the people were
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America, a pivotal moment in time
THERE WAS A time not too long ago when Americans looked at themselves and the nation they had built with immense pride. Ask people all around the world where they would choose to live and a big majority would say America. No doubt about it.
What happened? Look around and a big segment of the population is demanding that
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Is protesting our national pastime?
LET’S SAY YOU are the human resource manager for a company and you are tasked with hiring several hundred, maybe even several thousand, new teammates to help build a growing organization. You can offer an excellent compensation package and the current workforce seems to love
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Gadgets that changed the world
PEOPLE ALL AROUND the world and all nationalities are united in their fascination with gadgets. We’re always looking for the next labor-saving widget, gizmo or doodad. A gadget is a small mechanical or electric device or tool, especially an ingenious or novel one with a practical use.
What would you consider the No. 1 gadget that
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When will the senseless acts stop?
SUPPOSE CONGRESS WANTED to seize the moment and make real progress on police reform. No one should think federal reform will end all police abuses. In an act of bipartisan failure, Republican and Democrat leaders have decided to kick the can down the road for political purposes.
The Democrats call their bill the
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America, a land of many paradoxes
INDEPENDENCE DAY, COMMONLY known as the Fourth of July, commemorates the passage of the Declaration of Independence by the Continental Congress July 4, 1776. That was 244 years ago, this Saturday.
This weekend reminds us that
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What happened to the simple things?
WHAT WILL TOMORROW be like? Today’s innovators and dreamers think there is nothing we can’t do. There are no insurmountable obstacles. We just have to be creative and figure out a way to do the impossible.
Today, we’re waiting breathlessly for
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They don’t accept that it can’t be done
FOR THOUSANDS OF years, history has documented remarkable feats of building and manufacturing genius by engineers and architects. Ancient civilizations built memorials to empires. They knew no boundaries. They built mega structures and fortresses.
We are constantly asking “How
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Some DNA tests uncover revelations
MILLIONS OF PEOPLE have succumbed to the temptation to submit swabs to AncestryDNA®, 23andMe or MyHeritage™ expecting to discover a distant connection to royalty or celebrity. Some just wanted to fill in a few holes in their family’s tree.
But what if the kit results reveal secrets that affect not just your own family, but
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We lack faith, doubt competence
VOLTAIRE WARNED US in 1764 when he said “In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other.”
We will be heading to the polls in about five months to
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Outlook: Be optimistic, but realistic
DURING THESE PERPLEXING times, we have to wonder where our moral compass is. While tens of millions of people have stepped up when the country has needed them, there also have been millions of people who have succumbed to the temptation to game the system. Who can turn down
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