The language people use to talk about the Israel-Hamas war has power: It can contribute to misunderstanding and alienation, but it can also bring about appreciation for concepts that can seem impossible during this kind of conflict, such as peace. I was born to a Palestinian Arab father and an Israeli Jewish mother — a […]
Ben Bragdon
Staff Writer
Ben Bragdon is managing editor of the Sun Journal. Prior to that, he was deputy managing editor for news at the Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel. Ben was previously editorial page editor for those newspapers and Central Maine Sunday for more than 10 years. Before that, he was managing editor for weekly newspapers at Current Publishing in Westbrook. He began his career as a reporter at the Piscataquis Observer in Dover-Foxcroft and editor at the Moosehead Messenger in Greenville. He has a bachelor’s degree in history from Boston University.
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Commentary: Sure, people made fun of Jimmy Carter. I was lucky to have Jimmy Carter make fun of me
Jimmy Carter, who died Sunday, is the first presidential candidate I remember publicly expressing an opinion of. As it turned out, Carter would also be the first (and only) president to publicly express an opinion of me. During Carter’s presidency he was criticized and lampooned, but during his life he was more often hailed for […]
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Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Commentary: History gets Jimmy Carter wrong, both underrated and overrated
In the lives of public figures a tale often takes hold and that narrative becomes their story. In the case of Jimmy Carter, it goes like this: A humble peanut farmer and former Georgia governor defies extraordinary odds and wins the White House, through a combination of virtue, decency and a post-Watergate political cleansing. Over […]
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Commentary: Listening in a time of disinformation
The very fabric of truth is unraveling at an alarming rate. Howard Thurman’s wisdom about listening for the sound of the genuine is not just relevant but urgent. In the face of the escalating crisis of disinformation, distortion and the unsettling normalization of immoral and unethical practices, particularly in electoral politics and executive leadership, the […]
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Commentary: The election couldn’t solve our crisis of belief. Here’s what can
The stark divisions surrounding the recent presidential election are still with us, and will be for some time. The reason is clear: We have a crisis of belief in this country that goes much deeper than any single election. So many people, especially young people, have lost faith in America. We have lost belief in […]
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Commentary: Our enduring love of Ernest Shackleton exposes false ideas of leadership
It seems Ernest Shackleton’s legend has set sail again, this time courtesy of National Geographic and Disney+, which just released a new documentary on the discovery of the famed Anglo Irish explorer’s lost ship. Shackleton is best known for the trials of his ill-fated expedition to Antarctica, which set off in summer 1914 and saw […]
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Scholars Strategy Network: Trump’s electoral victory no landslide
The new president has no mandate, but that doesn’t mean his impact won’t be felt.
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Commentary: It took me 30 years to read the wartime letters my father wrote to my mother
Fifty-nine letters, bound by a brittle rubber band, saved in a dresser drawer for a half-century. Wartime letters sent by my father to my mother at her family home in Chicago, written in his own hand on Navy letterhead, the precise print of an engineer, angled slightly to the right. Yellowed on the edges but […]
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Commentary: Drain the swamp? More like overt, unapologetic swampy displays at Mar-a-Lago
Donald Trump is not following through on his promises to make government better.
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Hilary Koch: Where’s Waldo County’s birthing care?
When the county’s labor and delivery closes, it’ll give expectant mothers more than just a long drive.