Commentary, editorials and opinion, opinions

For the first time since the "don't ask, don't tell" law was enacted in 1993 by President Clinton, the House Armed Services Committee has scheduled hearings to review it. The law disqualifies gays from serving in the military.

John Ashcroft, former U.S. Senator as well as Attorney General, has been featured in congressional hearings on use of torture during his tenure at Justice. Democrats have stressed immorality of torture, in particular waterboarding, while Republicans rejoin that such painful practices have prevented a second 9/11.

A team of researchers with impeccable credentials and unquestionable independence is uttering an inconvenient truth that California and its politicians have ignored for much too long -- a peripheral canal is the least expensive, most environmentally positive way to repair the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta while maintaining vital water supplies.

Lately, there has been a push to get rid of the Electoral College -- the way we choose presidents -- and replace it with a pure popular vote.

Two new reports about our world reiterate the overwhelmingly positive impact of globalization upon our planet, making it more peaceful and more just.

Ronald Reagan started on radio, and to radio he returns. America's 40th president will share his conservative and free-market ideas on 60 stations from coast to coast. And not a second too soon.

It's kind of creepy that the network anchors are tagging along after Barack Obama on his great overseas adventure.

California Schools Superintendent Jack O'Connell unveiled newly calculated high school dropout data this week, pegging the overall rate at 24.2 percent and saying it would end reliance "on complicated formulas to make educated guesses about how many students were graduating and how many were leaving school without diplomas."

The Supreme Court took a welcome step when it recently invalidated a Louisiana law permitting the death penalty in cases of child rape. These are, to be sure, horrendous crimes that must be severely punished. But the death penalty is itself horrendous, and a measure that looks more problematic the more it is scrutinized.

While disagreeing with Barack Obama on maybe three-fourths of his so-far enunciated political views, I actually like and admire the guy, perhaps as eloquent a speaker and alert an intellect as has pursued the presidency in my lifetime.