Citizen Sourced

Memorial Day should be a day of reverence. It should be a day when the country pauses to remember the Americans who gave everything in service to this nation. It should not be a day for political theater, empty patriotism, or photo opportunities from people who have shown contempt for the very sacrifice they claim to honor. That is why I cannot look at Donald Trump’s record and pretend it is normal. Trump received five deferments during Vietnam. He has been credibly reported to have called American war dead “suckers” and “losers,” an account later backed by retired Marine General John Kelly, a Gold Star father. Again and again, Trump has treated military service not as a solemn duty, but as a prop — something to praise when it benefits him and demean when it does not. That contempt matters. Words matter. Character matters. A president who mocks sacrifice, belittles service, and treats the armed forces as an extension of his ego is not honoring the fallen. He is exploiting them. Pete He...

I am a Christian, and I am born again. But being born again does not require me to treat any politician like “the chosen man of God.” I have been accused of not being a Christian because I have criticized Donald Trump, who some people claim is a chosen man of God. He definitely is not. Yes, God can allow rulers to rise. Romans 13 teaches that governing authorities exist under God’s sovereignty. But “allowed by God” is not the same thing as “personally chosen as a righteous man of God.” God also allowed Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, and Pilate to hold power. That did not make them godly men. And judging fruit is not hatred. Jesus Himself said, “Ye shall know them by their fruits” (Matthew 7:16). Christians are commanded to test, discern, and refuse idolatry. Praying for a leader is biblical. Worshiping, excusing, or blindly defending a leader is not. Trump’s fruit includes many things that are not Christian. 1. First , he has repeatedly mocked, insulted, and degraded people instead of showin...

At some point, people need to call this what it is: Trump keeps making promises he either can’t keep or has no real plan to keep. That is lying to voters. He promised things like $2,000 tariff checks, cheaper groceries, $2 gas, dramatically cheaper medicine, a 10% credit card interest cap, and ending wars almost immediately. But those things either have not happened, were exaggerated, or would require action from Congress that he has not delivered.¹ ² ³ ⁴ For example, Trump promised Americans $2,000 tariff “dividend” checks in November 2025, but fact-checkers reported that no checks were being issued and that experts questioned whether the plan was even financially realistic.¹ He also pushed a 10% credit card interest cap in January 2026, but reports noted that no federal law or executive order had actually imposed that cap.² He promised $2 gas, but fact-checkers reported in 2025 that the national average was still above $3 and that no state average had fallen below $2.60 at the time.³...

The Watertown Unified School Board’s decision to pull Omar Thomas’s “A Mother of a Revolution!” from the Watertown Wind Symphony’s May 18 concert really concerns me. From everything I’ve seen, this was an instrumental piece with no lyrics, no slogans, and no political speeches built into the performance itself. The students weren’t being asked to campaign for a cause or endorse an ideology. They were performing a challenging contemporary concert work chosen for its musical and artistic value.  What seems to have driven the decision was the piece’s association with Marsha P. Johnson and LGBTQ+ history. And honestly, that’s what troubles me most. If we start removing music, art, or literature simply because some people dislike the associations surrounding it, then where exactly does that stop?  As someone who grew up in southeastern Wisconsin and went to high school in Oconomowoc — only about 13 miles from Watertown — this situation hits close to home for me. Watertown was our a...

Most democracy researchers point to the late 1990s through the early 2000s as the last period when the United States was consistently viewed as one of the world’s leading democracies. During the post–Cold War era, the nation was widely regarded as a global example of constitutional government, civil liberties, institutional stability, and peaceful transfers of power.¹˒² Over the last two decades, however, international democracy indexes have documented a measurable decline in the health of American democracy, driven by rising polarization, declining trust in institutions, disinformation, growing extremism, and increasing hostility between political factions.²˒³˒⁶ That decline accelerated dramatically after Donald Trump became president in 2017.¹ While democratic erosion in the United States did not begin with Trump, many scholars and historians argue that his presidency intensified existing weaknesses in ways unprecedented in modern American history.³˒⁴ Trump regularly attacked the leg...