Lori Falce Columns category, Page 8
Lori Falce: What’s the real outcome of Depp-Heard trial?
Our long national nightmare is over. The Johnny Depp-Amber Heard trial has come to an end. OK, I’m going to confess. I have been caught up in the weeks of testimony. The drama. The endless analysis of movie stars emoting in a courtroom and just as endless criticism of lawyers’...
Lori Falce: Stop telling me what won’t work
Every single time I hear about a school shooting, I am back to that Friday in December 2012. Around 10 a.m., I started making calls to area schools to get reactions to the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting. I was asking if the districts would be placing schools on lockdown or...
Lori Falce: Diagramming, commas and politics
You know how in school there are things you learn that seem utterly pointless and with no impact on your real life? Like how most people will never need to know anything about the Battle of Hastings. Or how most adults will agree they never used a quadratic equation after...
Lori Falce: The sordid case of the celebrity trial
I have never served on a jury. I’ve been called twice. Once was after I had already moved out of the county in question. The second time was while my mail was being held at the post office and I didn’t end up getting the notice until about two weeks...
Lori Falce: What I needed when I was bullied
Kids are resilient. When I was 9 years old, I was walking home from my Catholic school when several boys popped up from behind a car in the church parking lot and started pelting me with gravel while they called me a pig and made oinking sounds. A mom dragged...
Lori Falce: Why don’t we call Americans oligarchs?
When talking about Russia’s politics, espionage, criminal activities and, of course, the war in Ukraine, one word pops up with regularity. Oligarchs. The way in which it is used, and the authority that it conveys, makes it sound like oligarchs are an official position within the country. They might well...
Lori Falce: We could all be these parents
Where are the parents? Since Sunday, when Jaiden Za’mar Brown of North Braddock and Mathew Steffy-Ross of Pitcairn were shot and killed at a party on Pittsburgh’s North Side, I have heard that phrase repeated several times. I feel it each time like a punch I see coming and have...
Lori Falce: The blessing of quiet prayer
When I was a kid, we didn’t have Good Friday off. We spent it as we spent the Friday afternoons of Lent leading up to it — in church, following along as the Stations of the Cross walked us through the milestones of the Easter story. There was no question...
Lori Falce: Why are we reluctant to tax billionaires?
Who wants to be a billionaire? It’s an aspirational number that most people can’t truly fathom. Oh, they’d like to, but it’s hard to truly appreciate. The median household income in Pennsylvania is around $50,000. If you were able to hold on to every penny — spending nothing on food...
Lori Falce: Who should the Academy really investigate?
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is opening an investigation into Will Smith and the The Slap Heard ’Round the World. Except, wait a minute. No, they’re really not. From the moment Smith charged the stage during the live Oscars broadcast and slapped comedian Chris Rock for a...
Lori Falce: ‘Woman’ transcends a simple definition
“Can you provide a definition for the word ‘woman?’” Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., asked Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson this question Tuesday during the Senate judiciary committee confirmation hearings. There have been less obvious traps in Scooby Doo cartoons. Blackburn clearly wanted to coax Jackson to the edge...
Lori Falce: Would you kill Baby Hitler?
It’s the kind question that has been around forever. It’s the college coffeehouse brainstorming or the debate you have at the bar after a few drinks. It is the plot of movies and television shows and the books we read at the beach. It jump starts philosophy essays and thought...
Lori Falce: Banning books cages potential
The most miraculous invention in the history of the world is not something with a plug or gas tank. It is not a medicine or surgical technique. It doesn’t fly you to the moon or explore the inner workings of the Earth. But without it, none of that would have...
Lori Falce: Kanye West and the dangers of ignoring mental health
I am somehow confident that if I decided to make repeated veiled and not-so-veiled threats against an ex’s new love interest, I would receive a visit from law enforcement. This would be especially likely if those threats were on my social media accounts with just a thousand or so followers...
Lori Falce: The family drama of international politics
Sisters have a special kind of relationship. They share a bond that is hard to compare to anything else. They share more than just DNA and a bathroom and Grandma’s eyes. They are the only ones who will understand the highs and lows, the good and bad, the in-jokes and...
Lori Falce: Why doesn’t Russia play by the rules?
The rules never seem to be the rules in Russia. Not when it comes to politics or borders or even sports. It might seem ironic that the Russia-Ukraine situation is escalating in tensions at the same time the world’s athletes are gathered in China in what is supposed to be...
Lori Falce: The unreliable yardstick of the N-word
I was in second grade the first time I heard it. The N-word. It was used casually, without thought or explanation, like hundreds of other words a 7-year-old hears every day, leaving me to puzzle it out with context clues. It was said matter- of-factly, the same way someone would call...
Lori Falce: Celebrating my 1st vaccine anniversary, with no crocodile in sight
Happy vaxiversary to me. It popped up on my Facebook reminders — the post I shared a year ago to note my first dose of the covid-19 vaccine. Me, my face covered in my pink-and-purple tie-dyed mask that matched my kind of pinkish quarantine hair, holding up the card that...
Lori Falce: When to keep your kid home from school
We pay a lot of attention to the shortages of employees at work. The questions arise about what causes the shortages and what exacerbates them during the pandemic. Is it laziness? Is it burnout? Is it the rise and ebb of covid-19 numbers with various variants taking their turn as...
Lori Falce: Helping hands and the art of snow shoveling
I talked to Bob on Tuesday. It was the day after snow fell for almost 24 hours, piling up around the area to the delight of kids who got to build snowmen and go sledding. The problem for Bob was that he isn’t a kid anymore. He’s a senior who...
Lori Falce: Yes, your kid should watch the news at school
Should middle school kids be watching CNN in school? It’s a discussion a board member at Norwin School District wants to consider. CNN 10 isn’t the same round-the-clock programming that runs on your cable stations. It is a 10-minute program offering students bite-sized chunks of stories for kid consumption. Four...
Lori Falce: The worst Christmas present ever
In early December, I got an early surprise. It wasn’t a holiday card or a Christmas present or a plate of cookies. It was a lease renewal — with a 20% rent increase. Was this because I got a 200-pound Mastiff or decided to keep exotic snakes in my spare...
Lori Falce: What did you learn in 2021?
“I can’t wait to say goodbye to this dumpster fire of a year.” “I just want this year to be over.” “I want to pretend this year never happened.” This attitude is one I have become accustomed to hearing as December winds to a close each year. I have heard...
Lori Falce: With every Christmas card I don’t write
I am very sorry that you didn’t get a Christmas card from me. Whether you are my closest family members or my best friends, coworkers or acquaintances, you didn’t go to the mailbox and get a thin slice of cardboard with smiling pictures of my son over the course of...
Lori Falce: I don’t want to be Elon Musk rich
I will never be rich. Much as I might enjoy a private island and a chalet in Switzerland, I know that is not in my future unless I hit the Powerball jackpot. Journalism is not really the kind of career you pick with visions of wealth planning dancing in your...
