Commentary

By JOHN HALL
Monday, November 13, 2006
The Democrats have scored an impressive victory based largely on public misgivings about a Republican White House and its handling of the Iraq war.

This will put pressure on both the White House and the new Democratic-heavy Congress that begins work next year to produce results on this war.

How are they going to do that? There is no sign so far that either the Democratic leadership or President Bush has a workable plan to disengage U.S.

By PHILIP GAILEY
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Now that Democrats have regained control of the House, the first thing they should do is fumigate their side of the U.S. Capitol to rid the place of the stench of ethics rot and political corruption left behind by House Republicans.

By BONNIE ERBE
Friday, November 10, 2006
Message to Democrats on winning the U.S. House: this was no mandate. Republican ineptitude handed House control to Democrats, not Democratic superiority.

Just as President Bush deserves Olympic gold for overreaching (he called himself a uniter and governed like a seismic divider) Democrats run the risk of legislating from the extremities and living to regret it.

Democratic candidates who picked up GOP-controlled House seats were centrists, not extremists.

By REG HENRY
Sunday, November 12, 2006
With the midterm election serving as a cold shower applied to the national libido, especially with the horrible spectacle of the politicians having their wicked way with the facts, we can all be forgiven for having a collective headache.

An editorial / By Dale McFeatters
Friday, November 10, 2006
It's no secret that once you're past a certain age, clothing retailers start to lose interest, especially in men who, it is said, have little interest in clothes and indeed could not reliably identify the brands of the clothes they're wearing right now.

On the other hand, they have to wear something and Haggar Clothing figures, why not its slacks? And it's now targeting baby boomer males.

An editorial / By Dale McFeatters
Friday, November 10, 2006
In its 10 years of operation, Al-Jazeera, the Arab language news channel, has offended almost every country it has covered, including ours, and been frequently banned, so it must be doing something right.

Al-Jazeera's version of events in Iraq has been strikingly at variance with the Bush administration's, and the White House alternately courted it and denounced it and, according to one report, considered bombing it.

The Bush administration has spent hundreds of millions through the Pentagon and State Department promoting a positive view of the war in Iraq, and it has not spoken kindly with U.S.

By MARTIN SCHRAM
Friday, November 10, 2006
Now that the campaign speeches are over and the last negative ad nausea has been squeezed out of the tube, we will finally get to hear about what our leaders are really going to do to solve or at least resolve the crisis that is killing our best and bravest and crippling our country.

Iraq.

First we will hear from two of America's most eminent and respected public figures.

Editorial
Friday, November 10, 2006
It sounds ludicrous, and it is: The Willett Elementary School, in Attleboro, Mass., banned tag from its playgrounds during recess for fear of lawsuits.

Principal Gaylene Heppe, in outlawing all unstructured "touching" games, warned that recess is "a time when accidents can happen." Later, after parents complained and the national media descended, the school said it would review its policy.

By PAUL C. CAMPOS
Friday, November 10, 2006
The sad case of Ted Haggard, the politically powerful evangelical minister from Colorado Springs, Colo., who was forced to resign last week after allegations he had a sexual relationship with a male prostitute from whom he purchased crystal methamphetamine, has elicited some astonishing comments.

Perhaps the single most astounding reaction came from Mark Driscoll, a Seattle-area preacher who was recently named one of America's 25 most influential pastors by "The Church Report."

"It is not uncommon to meet pastors' wives who really let themselves go," Driscoll noted.

An editorial / By Dale McFeatters
Friday, November 10, 2006
"Long live the Arabs! Long live the Kurds!" shouted Saddam Hussein, who was responsible for killing so many of both, as he was led from the Baghdad courtroom where he had been sentenced to death for crimes against humanity.

In fact, it was one of his smaller crimes for which he is to be hanged, the systematic execution of 148 Shiite men and boys in 1982 whose crime was to live in a village not far from where the Iraqi leader's motorcade was fired upon.

The question of his guilt was foregone.