Brent Larkin

If we can’t keep kids healthy, and teach them to read and write, then all other investments in Cleveland’s future will eventually fail. Trump will then win his war on children. And every one of us will lose, writes columnist Brent Larkin today.

In the 1986 Ohio governor's race, underdog ex-Gov. Jim Rhodes resorted to disgusting gay-bashing tactics, depicting Dick Celeste as a homosexual sympathizer. It didn’t work then, it shouldn’t work now. If Ohio voters genuinely believe that truth and decency matter in public life, Ramaswamy’s lies and mud-slinging campaign will end the same way, writes Brent Larkin today.

For everyone involved in the dilemma of how to right-size funding for publicly owned stadium and arena repairs in Cuyahoga County, it’s important to remember that doing nothing would not be leadership. It would be cowardice, writes Brent Larkin today.

President Trump's repeated attacks on the many important underpinnings of American democracy means he doesn’t deserve to celebrate the Fourth of July. And this country doesn’t deserve him, writes Brent Larkin in his column today.

Fred Holiday, a kind, thoughtful, Harvard-educated Cleveland schools superintendent who came here in 1982 determined to make a difference. But a few members of the city’s then-elected school board tormented the soft-spoken Holiday, hoping he would leave. He left by taking his own life. “Use this event to rid yourselves of petty politics, racial politics, greed, hate and corruption," Holiday wrote in his suicide note. "This city deserves better. The children deserve better.” They still do, writes Brent Larkin.

How could a Republican candidate for governor in a bright red state be so intellectually dishonest that he lies about the need to fix a problem -- voter fraud -- that high-ranking members of his own party say doesn’t exist? The answer is obvious. He’s losing, writes Brent Larkin today.

Of course, steep declines in property valuations for downtown office buildings result in property tax cuts, which result in far less money for Cleveland's troubled school system. The dilemma here is that fixing the problem results in choosing from a list of bad options, writes Brent Larkin in his column today.

In close election campaigns, sleaze becomes MAGA’s weapon of choice. Unfortunately, it often works in Ohio. writes Brent Larkin in his column today.

Making Cleveland great again will require improving on the city election of 2025, when 82 out of every 100 Cleveland voters couldn’t be bothered. writes Brent Larkin in his column today.

Sens. Bernie Moreno and Jon Husted have compiled what may be the wors voting records of any senators in Ohio history, columnist Brent Larkin writes. Their voting records aren’t meant to serve Ohio’s underinformed voters, but to please a population of one in a nation of just under 350 million.