WASHINGTON, D.C.  Eager to put a major distraction behind him, President Obama today pronounced yesterday's "beer summit" with Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates and a Cambridge, Mass. policeman a "thoughtful" exchange except for the contributions of Vice President Joseph Biden, who crashed th

WASHINGTON, D.C.  A new report issued today by the American Society of Arithmetic Instructors reveals that innumeracy--mathematical illiteracy--has remained stubbornly resistant to efforts to improve Americans' math skills.

"Copying from each other isn't going to help--you're

Statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau indicate that 11.9% of all adult American males are known by the nickname "Mad Dog", while the remaining 88.1% have a friend or are related to another adult American male nicknamed "Mad Dog".  We know these figures are correct because if you add them 

NEW YORK.  National Football League Commissioner Roger Goodell today conditionally reinstated convicted animal abuser Michael Vick, but will limit the former Atlanta Falcons quarterback to ownership of miniature turtles and goldfish during a probationary period.

Mini-tur

JERUSALEM.  Special envoy George Mitchell launched his Middle East peace drive today by urging Arab leaders to take steroids and adopt the designated hitter rule, two measures he said laid the foundation for major league baseball's success following the player's strike in the mid-90's.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.  With President Obama's offer to have a beer with the police officer who arrested Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the controversy over whether racial profiling was involved would seem to be over.  But this is Cambridge, Massachusetts, where no point is too t

WASHINGTON.  You can call Hillary Clinton a lot of things and not get her dander up; a former Young Republican, a political Tammy Wynette, an opportunist for falsely claiming to be a lifelong Yankees fan in the heat of the New York Senate race.  But the one quality the world

MIAMI.  They came from all walks of life, from all areas of the country; men, many balding and with drooping paunches, just hoping, they said, to gain the same rights as other Americans. 

March for Men's Rights to Marry Porn Stars

"I've always wanted to settle down with a

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.  After details emerged appearing to exonerate the Cambridge, Mass. policemen who arrested noted scholar and writer Henry Louis Gates, Jr. at his home, the black Harvard professor dropped his demand that the officers involved receive sensitivity training and compr

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.  Police officers who arrested Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. responded to charges of racism today, saying that Gates had a James Taylor album, a batik print and other evidence of illicit drug use in open view when they entered his apartment.

Henry Louis Gates,

WASHINGTON.  It was, advisors warned him, the ultimate high risk moment of his young presidency; before a national and international television audience, with no teleprompter to depend on, President Barack Obama threw out the ceremonial first pitch at the 2009 Major League Baseball All-Star Gam

“He who controls magnetism, controls the world.”  So said Diet Smith, a character in the Dick Tracy comic strip when I was a boy.  Smith was the inventor of Dick’s two-way wrist radio, a precursor to cell phones and those groovy new Blue Tooth sunglasses that have a phone

As someone who watches a great deal of baseball from the comfort of an easy chair, beer in hand, I often ask myself the question, "How do major league umpires manage to stay in such lousy shape all season long?"

Bruce Froemming

The answer is, it isn't easy.  "You don't

CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo.  Lyle Carroll is the starting left fielder for the Cape Girardeau River Rats, a AA affiliate of the Chicago White Sox, but opponents' scouting reports paint a pessimistic picture of his chances of reaching the big leagues.  "Can't hit curve ball," says one in the telegr

HOLLYWOOD.  Mariah Carey, the pop songstress who is known for the phenomenal upper register of both her voice and her body, today signed on as national celebrity chair of the Campaign to Cure Ditziness.

Carey:  If she were a Hawaiian apartment building, that deck would be refe

NEWTON, Mass.  It's 5:15 on a Wednesday afternoon, and Marci Klum-Walz, a mutual fund accountant, is stuck in traffic on the Massachusetts Turnpike driving to pick up her daughter at summer camp.  "At some point, I'll give up my car," she says by cell phone.  "That poin

RIDGEWOOD, New Jersey.  Amy Webster describes her new 5,000 square foot, five-bedroom home in this affluent suburb of New York as her dream come true.  "We finally have four separate air-conditioning zones," she says with relief.  "Now I don't have to fight with the kids over the ther

STOCKHOLM, Sweden.  The Nobel Foundation, which awarded a Nobel Peace Prize jointly to former vice president Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, today announced that it would seek a refund of the prize money as the earth's temperature has dropped since his film,

CHEYENNE, Wyoming.  It was, political pundits agree, the shock of a lifetime.  Freed from the burdens of office, former Vice President Dick Cheney told a National Press Club luncheon last month that he supports gay marriage, putting him to the left of President Obama and Secretar

BUFFALO, N.Y.  In this city, as in so many others, there are more than enough lawyers outside of a few hot specialties right now, such as bankruptcy.  "We've got people around here who are snapping off their pencil points just so they'll have an excuse to sharpen them," says Michael

WASHINGTON, D.C.  The Republican National Governors Association is expected to call for the resignation of embattled South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford this week, saying the tone of his emails to an alleged lover crossed the line of acceptable behavior into "mushy, gushy, schmoopsie-woopsie t