Editorial: Pay as You Weigh

A story problem: Mary weighs 120 pounds and is traveling with a 12-pound baby, a 30-pound diaper bag and two suitcases with a combined weight of 80 pounds. Dick weighs 155 and hauls a 10-pound duffel. Bob weighs 280 and is dragging a 40-pound wheel-aboard suitcase. How much …

Editorial: The Craft of Writing

We suppose we should have seen it coming, but count us as shocked and dismayed to learn that cursive handwriting is disappearing from the American public school curriculum. According to an Associated Press story that appeared in Tuesday’s Valley News, instruction in penmanship is dying out, collateral damage …

• Letter: Our Handwriting Problems

Editorial: Money Well Not Spent; Hartford Holds Off on Taser Purchase

It’s hard to imagine a better way to not spend $7,000 than Hartford’s decision to keep a police department appropriation for stun guns sitting in the town’s bank account. The Selectboard approved spending the money last year in response to a request by then-Police Chief Glenn Cutting and …

Editorial: Seastrand Resigns

It’s hard to decide which is more disturbing: the abuse of authority that David Seastrand allegedly engaged in and which led to his resignation last week as chief of the New London police, or the fact that he has gotten off relatively lightly for an act that, if …

Editorial: Screening Applicants; Employers Shouldn’t Ban Smokers

The best way to hire productive employees is to look for people with qualifications, talent, honesty and commitment. Now, however, a small but growing number of employers are looking for something else as well: job applicants who don’t smoke. As much as we despair of the death and …

Editorial: Privatized Prisons

Prison privatization was probably not going to happen in New Hampshire any time soon, but that does not mean that the state wasted the $171,000 it spent on a consultant to help study the question. Indeed, after months of reviewing four companies’ proposals to build and/or operate prisons …

Editorial: Eradicating Polio

The end of polio is in sight. Last year, there were fewer cases of the disease, 223, in fewer endemic countries, three, than ever. Still, the eradication campaign can seem like Achilles’ effort to outrun the tortoise in Zeno’s paradox: There’s always a little more ground to cover. …

Editorial: Targeting Gun Makers; N.H. Woos Disgruntled Manufacturers

In Connecticut, lawmakers appalled by last December’s massacre at the Sandy Hook Elementary School reached bipartisan agreement this week on what is being hailed as the most far-reaching gun-control legislation in the country. Among other things, it would require anyone purchasing a rifle or shotgun to obtain a …

Editorial: The Revenue Problem

Well, crusading Republicans in Congress have relented and provided additional money to keep federal meat inspectors on the job, largely because the secretary of agriculture and the powerful beef and poultry industries convinced lawmakers that not reversing that particular reduction would have an intolerable impact on meat processing. …

Editorial: Comfort Zone; The Wisdom of Pushing Weatherization

It has always been a bit of a mystery to us why, when so many contentious issues surround climate change and renewable energy, more emphasis is not placed on one that is eminently uncontroversial — making buildings more energy efficient. Perhaps the answer is as simple as this. …