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By MATT L. BARRON and JON WEISMANN

On Dec. 11, the U.S. House passed the Lower Costs, More Transparency Act, legislation to require Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) to disclose drug rebates and discounts, revealing what they pay drug makers for prescription drugs. The bill would also...

By TOM WEINER

I want to start with the conclusion of this story, which is expressed in its simplest form in the title. Palestinians and the Jews of Israel are arguably two of the most hurt people in the annals of human history. Nowhere are the consequences of their...

By JOHN SKIBISKI

Ukraine today is probably sorry it agreed to give up its third largest arsenal of nuclear arms because of assurances of future protection. Underestimated was possible political wrangling making the promise fragile at best while people are being killed...

By PETER M. HAAS

The recently concluded Climate Change COP28 (the 28th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change) surprised many observers by generating more concrete decisions than had been expected. Most...

By RICHARD SZLOSEK

Well, the powers that be in Northampton have unanimously decided to reduce our Main Street down to two lanes of traffic. The project apparently won’t even begin until 2025 and I have stayed out of the discussion because, at my advanced age, who knows...

By DINA LEVI

Frequently while perusing the opinion page of the Gazette, I pause on the cartoon, not always feeling like I’m fully understanding it. I imagine, more than anything, they’re meant to catch the reader’s attention, and at times in doing so, blur the...

By ALAN KANNER

On Veteran’s Day, Nov. 11, 2023, Donald Trump crossed the line. In his Claremont, New Hampshire speech, he said: “We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the...

By SUSIE MOSHER

The article “Bill seeks to give terminally ill options” published in the Gazette on Oct. 23 gave a slanted report on the public hearing held at the State House on Oct. 20. From reading the article one would be led to believe opponents of the Medical...

By BILL SCHER

I never thought much about Calvin Coolidge until 2005, when I moved to downtown Northampton, mere blocks from his presidential museum. But after visiting the museum, I suddenly had more questions.For example, Coolidge is known as the quintessential...

By JONATHAN A. WRIGHT

When I was 11 years old, I traveled to the Middle East with my family, and one day we took a car from Beirut, then a French-flavored multi-ethnic city, to see the massive Roman temple ruins at Baalbek, evidence of one of many colonial occupations....

By BISHOP WILLIAM D. BYRNE and MEMBERS of CATHOLICS FOR INCLUSION

In 2021, Pope Francis instituted a call to every Catholic congregation, and beyond, to take part in a worldwide synod, an invitation to even non-Catholics who wished to participate, to listen to people and ask how the Holy Spirit was moving them, and...

By DICK EVANS

Today, Dec. 5, 2023, is the 90th anniversary of a remarkable — and rarely remarked upon — episode in American history, having enormous consequences in law, in commerce, in families and in culture. More remarkable was its path, perhaps the best-kept...

By JOHN BERKOWITZ

Despite the awful carnage of the war between Israel and the Palestinians, and its risk of becoming an even more lethal regional conflagration, I’m deeply concerned that if the war between Ukraine and Russia isn’t brought soon to a negotiated end, it...

By TERRENCE MCCARTHY

I just bought Tracy Kidder’s new book “Rough Sleepers.” The title refers to people.who are experiencing homelessness in the state’s capital city, Boston. Kidder’s focus is on Boston physician Jim O’Connell’s mission to help that city’s legions of...

By JOSEPH SILVERMAN

A recent article reported on a climate science expert who resigned from the Hadley Climate Change Committee after she responded to challenges from committee members with an emotional outburst that included profanity [“Climate panel member quits,”...

By ELIZABETH VOLKMANN

Now that our first frost has brought our sweet autumn weather to an end, the colorful leaves that delivered such joy have lost their grasp and fluttered to the ground. Browned, dried and litter-like, they invite our immediate impulse to mow, mulch,...

By MARISA LABOZZETTA

I grew up in a predominantly working-class Italian American neighborhood in Brooklyn.My father, the sole college graduate, was an exception who worked his way through school laboring in the construction world along with the rest of his family by day...

By JOHN PARADIS

Last week, I watched a 1-pound eastern gray squirrel roll a 10-pound pumpkin across our yard to the edge of our woods.Then, in a matter of minutes, the rodent gnawed off the stem and chewed a hole. It continued to bore inside, eventually fitting its...

By WILLIAM LAMBERS

It was Thanksgiving in 1963 when a group of 25 people in Plymouth, Massachusetts had an idea: Let’s skip Thanksgiving dinner. These men and women, in the town where America’s first Thanksgiving was held by the Pilgrims, decided to fast at Plymouth’s...

By IAN RHODEWALT

My first union job, and my first strike for cost of living increases, was as a teacher in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank. Several weeks ago, trade unions in Palestine put out an urgent call of solidarity to unions around the world on on Oct. 16 to...