Column

The editorial cartoon by Cal Grondahl in Wednesday's paper drew some strong and, in my opinion, unwarranted negative reaction from several readers.

During campaign appearances in 2008, Americans were swept off their feet (some quite literally if you take into account the swooning women) with the idea of "hope and change." In almost childlike faith, people grabbed on to the promise that then Senator Barack Obama was a different kind of politician who promised to be the proverbial tie binding us together in unity. Red and Blue would fade away into purple as we laid down our individualism in pursuit of "the greater good." Believing a new day had dawned on American politics, the awestruck responded to one of the greatest marketing ruses in American history with a hearty: "Dude, this whole hope and change thing is definitely the way to go."

The latest embarrassment from President Barack Obama is more than an embarrassment. It's an assault on faith that begins with a 2,500-page health care bill enacted with no one expected to read it except the bureaucrats paid to translate its obscurities into thousands more pages of regulations.

After a prolonged look at a phrase that could have been interpreted multiple ways, the president and the masters of your life in the Department of Health and Human Services bypassed the sensible and decreed we are now in the age of mandated contraception coverage, one step closer to Utopian bliss.

Yet another intimate portrait has just emerged about one of the most prominent and pivotal world leaders of the early 1960s, arguably the most dangerous and highly charged years of the Cold War.

An iconic hero for many, thanks to his charismatic personality and demonstrated courage, this former head of state is also controversial thanks to personal behavior, which can only be described as reckless.

Listening to the 911 tapes now, after we know what was about to happen at family killer Josh Powell's house, the 911 call takers seem agonizingly dense and rude.

They ask questions that seem bizarrely off point, constantly interrupting and speaking over callers as they try to explain themselves.

As Powell is about to strike his children with a hatchet and set his house on fire, a 911 call taker asks Powell's case worker, who is calling from her cell phone in the driveway in front of his house, "Are you in a vehicle now or on foot?"

How many of us are fearful to start a new business, change career directions, retire or... The list could go on forever.

When I retire, I want to learn printmaking from Joe Dixon.