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Columnists

ANDY PITZER: Silent Barter

Take a look at your salt shaker the next time you sit down at the dinner table. Or the canister of Morton’s Salt in your cupboard. Now take a gander...

FRED FIRST: Spaces: Inner, Outer & Other

I exist even still in a “liminal space” (which could be a whole other post—with...

ANDY PITZER: Paraphrasing GPT

When I come to think about it, probably the one thing I’m most proud of...

BOB BROWN: IF YOU LOVE YOUR BRAIN, TAKE CARE 0F IT, PART THREE

This is A Brief Educational Summary of Neuroscience 101, Part THREE, our final section. These...

SERWAN ZANGANA: It’s time for positive change in Roanoke City, vote James Creasy for Sheriff

An enthusiastic and experienced law enforcement officer, a veteran deputy, is eager to bring changes...

White House Christmas Cards: 1945 to the Present

President Ulysses S. Grant made Christmas Day (December 25) a national holiday in 1870. From that point forward, a Christmas card from the White...

Where Mixology Meets Etymology

 Nobody is quite sure where the name comes from. But the drink has its roots in many forms of milk-and-alcohol libations that were...

Regulations Bring More And More Federal Jobs

Recently, a reporter on my car radio announced that Congress had passed some important legislation with the name CALM. The letters stand for...

Christmas In The Forties

Packages wrapped in ornate paper, topped with festive bows cluster beneath the Christmas tree. As I survey them, I remember a more modest...

Foolish Politics and The Fiscal Cliff

Commentators are talking about ‘the Fiscal Cliff’ on TV and radio. Critics, political wonks, even religious leaders are gasping at the prospect of...

The Season of Giving is Well Under Way

New Jersey native John Turner runs a water removal business in Chicago. Recently, after seeing the devastation of Superstorm Sandy, he loaded his...