Marci Penner challenged the audience Thursday to be more receptive to change and to break away from being “a culture of ‘no.’” Sometimes what’s needed is to “break up the power paradigm of the older…

Life and health exemptions to abortion bans are complex. With the legality of abortion effectively on Tuesday’s Aug. 2 ballot, Kansans should understand how looming government regulations might affect women’s health. If the abortion amendment…

Before I left for a short May trip to Massachusetts, our historic Topeka neighborhood sported four “Vote Yes” signs for the proposed “Value Them Both” amendment to the Kansas Constitution, on the ballot Aug. 2.…

Despite the fervent support the Republican leadership has given to the Value Them Both amendment, its fate on August 2 may not tell us much about the current Kansas GOP. But the Republican contest for…

“We believe fervently in the American Way, which stands for the separation of religion and state. Naturally, we are to live out our beliefs within the political state as private citizens, but we do not…

The house where I was raised had an open shelf rule. This meant my brother and I were allowed to read anything, no matter how inappropriate or beyond our years. We never had to ask.…

KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainians refer to Vladimir Putin as “Putler,” an amalgamation of Putin and Adolf Hitler. The label is more than a jab at Putin’s obscene lie that Russia invaded Ukraine to fight Nazis…

Jan. 6 rioter Stephen Ayres isn’t nearly as deserving of our sympathy as the U.S. Capitol police officers to whom he apologized this week. Still, I did feel for him as he testified about being…

On a recent camping trip to Kings Canyon National Park I had the opportunity to escape the light-polluted vistas of the city and look through a pair of binoculars at the stars under a dark…

Recent mass shootings in Highland Park, Illinois; Buffalo, New York; and Uvalde, Texas, have produced the same futile debates that always follow such tragedies. Conservatives blame mental illness, and liberals blame gun access. But we…