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Columnists

BOB BROWN: When the Underdog Bites Has Rabies, and a Mean Owner

We have a strong human urge to identify with the “underdog.” There is nothing new about this tendency. The biblical story of David and Goliath, reported 3000 years ago,...

ROBERT L. MARONIC: Is Phase Two Of Trump‘s Peace Plan In The Gaza Strip Doomed To Fail? – Part II

Unfortunately, Trump’s present ceasefire as of October 9 is analogous to the armistice signed between...

ROBERT L. MARONIC: Is Phase Two Of Trump‘s Peace Plan In The Gaza Strip Doomed To Fail? – Part I

Phase one of Trump‘s twenty-point peace plan in the Gaza Strip, which began on October...

FRED FIRST: Approaching the Longest Night

Yes, you’re right—if you’ve even noticed—that this space has been neglected for some weeks now,...

A Life Well-Lived: Shirley Padgett Lester (1947-2025)

Shirley Padgett Lester of Vinton went to her heavenly reward October 4. Below is the...

Wandering in Shanghai, Jewel of the Orient

Street food is always a good bet, so I try some more. The grinning vendor/cook is baking a tortilla-like pastry on a half-meter wide...

Between Nothing and Everything: A New Year

January takes its name from Janus, the Roman god of portals, of comings and goings, beginnings and endings—an odd-looking, two-faced deity who looks...

Consider The Twelfth Night

by H. Bruce Rinker, Ph.D. I don’t know about you, but I’m repulsed every Fall when I see Halloween witches, Thanksgiving pilgrims, and Christmas Santa’s...

It’s The Holidays When All Thoughts Turn To South American Polo Players, Bathing Beauties, Xavier Cugat And Mistaken Identities

How's that?  Here's how:  It starts with all-American beauty Esther Williams and Latin lover Ricardo Montalban.  In the 1940's Hollywood paired them in...

“Until One Has Loved an Animal . . .”

I was using my lathe in my outdoor wood shop when McChesney came to call. He sat first here, then there, I fed him...

Recognizing God’s Grace

God’s grace often comes in unexpected, unrecognized ways, and, truth be told, is sometimes unwelcome. Such was my experience when I learned that...