Opinion
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Will Subu Vedam Prevail?
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Updated 12:28 p.m. Feb. 5 with new hearing times. It all comes down to the size of a bullet and a bullet hole, measured in fractions of an inch. Subramanyam Vedam, imprisoned 42 years on a murder rap, will be back in court on Thursday, hoping a ballistics expert will convince a judge to grant…
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Hook: Changes Would Improve Transparency of Governing Council That Will Pick New Penn State Alumni Association CEO
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I have been a lifetime member of the Penn State Alumni Association for well over 30 years. It’s a badge of honor I share with more than 173,000 others. And, our favorite mantra since 1995 is that we’re the largest dues-paying alumni association in the world. A pretty impressive statistic and one I’ve repeated many…
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Letters: Trustee Candidate ‘All In’ for the ‘Soul of Penn State’; ‘Casino Chaos’; Judicial Retention
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Fellow Nittany Lion alumni, my name is Jeff Ballou ’90. We love to be in “all-in” for the Penn State family. We love it when we win. But what happens when our winnings aren’t spread evenly across the whole pride of lions? The headlines about our winning ways are now becoming overshadowed by the prospect…
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A Time to Remember Our History, and to Speak Out
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Monday, Jan.27, was Holocaust Remembrance Day and marked the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. It is a day to remember an era that represents the very worst of man’s inhumanity to man. The raids, the roundups, the deportations, the killing of millions and millions of people is a sin which marks all…
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Op-Ed: Getting to Know ‘Subu’ Vedam
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Subramanyam Vedam, a former State College resident incarcerated at the State Correctional Institute at Huntingdon, has for many years been seeking his freedom based on his claim that he is innocent of the 1980 crime of killing another State College resident, Thomas Kinser. This fall Centre County Judge Jonathan Grine ruled that Mr. Vedam is entitled…
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Trump 2.0: Smile Though Your Heart Is Breaking
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Some of my friends don’t like it when I say Donald Trump is ridiculous. A pie in the face is ridiculous, they say. Trump is dangerous. I agree he’s dangerous. Just look at that blizzard of Day One executive orders. But it’s better for my mental health if, like an editorial cartoonist or a late-night…
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In the Year 2525, or 2025?
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Welcome to the year 2025. For those of us old enough to remember the summer of ’69 – maybe we got our first real six-string – we know we only have exactly five centuries to go until the year 2525 – the prophetic first year in the one-hit wonder song by Zager & Evans, “In…
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Letter: Nittany Mall Casino Will Be a ‘Blemish’ on Lubert’s Legacy and State College Area
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Happy Valley residents who drive past the long-vacant former Macy’s store at the Nittany Mall will notice a brand-new perimeter construction fence surrounding the future site of the Nittany Casino that Ira Lubert will build as a token of his appreciation to the Penn State community. When completed, his 24/7 casino gambling venue will stand…
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A 12-Team Playoff History: What Might Have Been for Penn State Through the Years
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With the end of Penn State’s 16-game season amid a 12-team College Football Playoff run, it’s a good time to look back and play with what might have been for Penn State if the 12-team playoff had been the norm in the modern post-World War II era of college football. First let’s start with setting…
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There’s Nothing Funny About a Censored Cartoon
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One of the joys of teaching journalism is that I can count on the news itself to provide made-to-order lesson plans. Take what happened at the Washington Post last week. Ann Telnaes, a Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist, presented a draft of a drawing to her editor that depicted four men and a certain cartoon mouse in…