Opinion

It was fortunate no one passed close by when I walked up to a historical marker in Sherman, Texas, a few days ago. The marker read, “The Great Sherman Storm of 1896: In the late afternoon of Friday, May 15, 1896, a disastrous tornado swept Sherman, killing about 66 persons, injuring many others, and causing severe property damage.

For good reason, the fight to unionize Starbucks has drawn considerable public attention since workers at a Buffalo, New York store voted to unionize in December of 2021. Since that time, workers at more than 300 stores, representing more than 8000 workers, have so voted. The campaign has been met with strong company resistance, resulting in legal rulings that found Starbucks violating federal labor law by (among other things) illegally surveilling workers, firing workers involved in union organizing, and adding workers at specific workplaces to dilute union strength. In an eventful year-and-a-half, the company has failed to negotiate a single contract.

In its May 30 issue, the premier science journal Nature just detailed the new science curriculum being mandated in India. Combined with prior actions concerning switching from English to Hindi as the major language of communication, India appears to be more rapidly drifting toward being a religious-led state or theocracy.

Dear Doctors: I have been having some problems with voiding my bowels, and my doctor has started talking about GI motility. Can you explain what that is? She also wants me to have something called anorectal manometry testing. I would like to know more about that, too.

In the nonelection timeframe spanning Jan. 1, 2021, to Dec.

Each month I want to provide you with regular updates about what’s going on in our nation’s capital and throughout the 4th District of Kansas. Here’s what happened in May.