Women should retain exam choice

The first news blurbs Monday seemed like the sort of rushed reporting that would be followed by a journalist's red-faced correction. Then it got more shocking. The blurbs were true.

Reforms needed in our schools

I have an acquaintance that is so sarcastic - should I say cynical - that when I told him I was writing about education reform, he asked how would it affect high-school football.

Reality check required on drugs

During his immersion in his new job, Gil Kerlikowske attended a focus group of 7-year-old girls and was mystified by their talk about "farm parties." Then he realized they meant "pharm parties" - sampling pharmaceuticals from their parents' medicine cabinets. What he learned - besides that young humans have less native sense than young dachshunds - is that his job has wrinkles unanticipated when he became director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy.

Leaves leave leaf lifter languishing

I thought I left this chore in the mountains.

California ports losing dominance

As America's trade with the Far East - principally China - expanded massively during the 1980s and 1990s, California reaped the benefits as the gateway for both exports and imports. With trade emerging as a major component of the state's very diverse economy, traffic and payrolls blossomed at its major ports.

Irrationality plentiful on hard right

For right-wing Republicans, the presidency of George W. Bush began as a dream come true. People calling themselves "conservatives" ran everything in Washington. Even before the GOP won both houses in 2002, Congress gave Bush everything he asked for. Republican apparatchiks controlled every agency from the Pentagon to the Treasury Department. FOX News savants expressed intermittent outrage that dissent was permitted. Rush Limbaugh's interviews of Dick Cheney sounded like a high-school girl gushing over the Jonas Brothers.

Politically correct, morally wrong

Suppose Major Nidal Hasan had called a meeting of agents of the FBI and top officers of Fort Hood, and then said something like this:

Palin still aiding Democrat cause

There are times, but admittedly few, when I'm obliged to correct myself. This is one of those times.

Perzell helped GOP candidates

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - The ranks of current and former state House Republican legislators, prosecutors allege, are littered with people whose election-day efforts benefited from the illegal use of taxpayer-paid resources.

Jobs summit, for what it's worth

There is something about that familiar phrase, "White House summit," that induces mental fatigue and makes you realize we're in trouble.

John Perzel finally done in

There is no facet of our lives richer with irony and tragic comedy than the seamy world of politics. The latest illustration of it has been provided by indicted Republican legislator and former House Speaker John Perzel.

Fayette County must start thinking in regional terms

It is time for Fayette County's 42 municipalities to end decades of pa-rochialism in providing public services, so I am inviting all citizens, elected officials and community leaders to stand together and craft a bold new initiative on regionalization.

Northeast resorts offering snow fun

The snowsports resorts of Stowe Mountain, Smugglers' Notch, Mount Snow, Plattekill Mountain and Labrador Mountain are positioned to get plenty of natural snow, and, as a backup, they have great snowmaking abilities.

Lazarus story still has relevance today

The Holy Gospel according to St. Luke includes the account of the experiences of poor Lazarus and the rich man. (Lk.16:19-31) The rich man was preoccupied with his wealth. He was inattentive to poor Lazarus at his gate.

Doing God's will can be difficult

By Lori Rodeheaver

Slow recovery from injury to knee

I knew immediately that I was in trouble.

California councilwoman raises questions

I feel that I must respond to attorney Melenyzer's statements in the article published in this paper on Nov. 6.

Has Bernie Madoff a deal for you

If there is actually a devil, maybe financier Bernie Madoff really did make a deal with him - it? - the classic Faustian bargain.

World cool to global warming woe

Intelligent people agree that, absent immediate radical action regarding global warming, the human race is sunk. That is a tautology because those who do not agree are, definitionally, unintelligent. Britain's intelligent prime minister, Gordon Brown, gives scary precision to the word "immediate." By his reckoning

Why's wife digging holes in yard?

I may have to hide the shovel.