My seat rides up and down on a cushion of air, slides forward and back on smooth nylon rollers and has eight separate comfort adjustments. Situated approximately six feet off the ground, my seat affords me a good view of my office: the highways of this country. Where I sit, where I spend 10 to […]

Hold theline onspendingThe Maine Legislature, which meets twice as often as its peer in Texas and is nearly four times the size of its peer in Nebraska, is in full session. Draft bills are being numbered by the hundreds and hearing schedules are being posted.Maine’s lawmaking body is big and it’s busy.Next week, the Appropriations […]

It may be the ultimate weight loss plan.No diet, no exercise, no surgery, no pills. Just a little digital wizardry. Point and click here, point and click there, and unwanted pounds melt magically away – from your photographed image, that is.This is what the British edition of GQ magazine recently did, altering photographs of actress […]

Wass ein cowboy. Quel cowboy. Oy vay, a cowboy.The word “cowboy” is not translatable. It holds its own, no matter the language. It conjures up the American myth greater than life-size on the big screen under a big sky. It’s not a myth that easily wraps around a graduate of Yale with an M.A. in […]

President Bush, in arguing to revoke the dividend tax, said “it’s unfair to tax money twice.”The government, he told Time magazine, “ought to be content with taxing revenue streams or profits one time, not twice.”If it’s so unfair, his economic-stimulus plan must then also revoke other double and triple taxes on income and estates.As Time […]

When the French call you arrogant, it’s sort of like Michael Jackson calling you eccentric.Your first response is to marvel at the pot’s audacity in criticizing the kettle’s color scheme. France is, after all, the nation where condescension was born.The problem is, they just may have a point. Certainly, the remarks that occasioned last week’s […]

AstroTurf is an amazing product. It’s low maintenance, tough to destroy and long lasting.If you don’t mind fake, it’s great.When it comes to expressions of opinion, though, fake is destructive. Mass orchestration of opinion cheapens genuine public discourse and diminishes the exchange of ideas.And, yet, more and more political action committees and other politically motivated […]

Chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix has concluded that Iraq has failed to live up to numerous resolutions calling for the disarmament of Saddam Hussein’s regime. No matter how much spin or false hope is derived from his report, that is the bottom line.Opponents of any war with Iraq for any reason (such as France […]

As we begin the countdown toward an Iraq war, I can’t help remembering America’s – and Israel’s – experiences in Lebanon.I covered the 1982-1983 Lebanon war, when Israel invaded that country to drive out the guerrillas of the Palestine Liberation Organization who were based there. I also covered the bitter aftermath, when the United States […]

When “60 Minutes” first appeared on our television screens in 1968, news wasn’t entertainment.Although entertaining, “60 Minutes” is not news veneer.Sure, it features soft interviews with funny guys like Billy Crystal and Hollywood glams like Nicole Kidman, but the foundation of the news program is information served straight up.We have producer Don Hewitt, who created […]