According to an old story, Alfred Nobel picked up a newspaper one morning and read an account of his death. It seems a relative had died and the reporter mistakenly assumed it was the famed inventor.

When I was 9 years old, I spent spring break with my grandparents in their humble mountains abode.

In an era of political correctness, virtue signaling and woke-ness, wisdom is in such short supply that when discovered it stands out like a beacon in a storm.

In the 1964 presidential campaign, Republican candidate Barry Goldwater had a slogan: "In your heart you know he's right."

The Union victory at Gettysburg has gone down in history as the turning point of the Civil War. In fact, there were several turning points, all bloody with high casualties, all considered necessary by both sides to win the war. Nonetheless, President Abraham Lincoln considered a small river …

This is a thank you note, though it might take a minute for me to get to the gratitude. It’s hard for me to feel deserving of the kindness you’ve given me.

President Biden has pledged to "help narrow the racial wealth gap and reinvest in communities that have been left behind by failed policies." He used the 100th anniversary of the Tulsa race massacre in Greenwood, a thriving African American community ravaged by a racist mob in 1921, as the occasion to promise more federal contracts for minority-owned companies and address discrimination in home appraisals for black families.

Something happened on Friday, May 21, 2021 in Washington, D.C., that thrilled my soul.

The writer of Ecclesiastes said, “Better is the end of a thing than its beginning” (Ecclesiastes 7:8). I wonder if you agree?

There is a Kodak photo in an old scrapbook which I found buried in my office closet. It made me do some thinking.

Low, slow, reliable. No, I’m not describing yours truly. Those three words were the motto sewed into the shoulder patch of the 18th Army Aviation Company in Vietnam. They flew the low, slow, but reliable Canadian-built U-1A Otter. Jeffrey “Bic” Bickerton spent 14 months in Vietnam as the cre…

Senate Republicans refused to go along with the House and establish a commission to investigate the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, which left five people dead and more than 100 police officers injured. By a vote of 54 to 35, the bill to form the "bipartisan" commission failed. But who really believes that it would have been truly bipartisan?

Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas is reportedly considering the development of tools that would help America's children discern truth from lies and know when they are being fed "disinformation."

In outlining the goal for winning the Persian Gulf War against Saddam Hussein for invading and occupying Kuwait in 1991, Gen. Colin Powell, then the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said, "Our strategy to go after this army is very, very simple. First, we're going to cut it off, and then we're going to kill it."

Country music, it is said, tells the stories of the common man.

The Supreme Court this fall will hear a case from Mississippi that bans most abortions after 15 weeks, except in cases of rape where the crime has been reported to police, or the life of the mother is in danger.

A thoughtful physician who takes time to deal with his patients as whole persons says that he has discovered that “99 out of a hundred individuals are lonely. And the one who says he/she isn’t probably is.” Loneliness is indeed a universal problem and yet it comes to each of us on an individual basis.

Throughout my training, education and writings, I had never heard the phrase "Angel from a foxhole," especially pertaining to a war. Yet, in February of 1944, a little angel was found in a foxhole in the middle of a world war. The location was in the insufferable humidity and equatorial heat…

Observing the ouster of Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) from her House leadership position and her criticism of former president Donald Trump, reminded me of a '70s TV ad for Listerine mouthwash.

An acquaintance of mine once told me a story about television icon Andy Griffith. It’s a parable that has never left my memory.

Britain has made the month of May this year particularly important in political and electoral terms. Thanks to a combination of public health challenges, and political party changes, local and regional elections assume greater than usual importance.

Signs have been a part of Middle East lore dating back to biblical times. People in the region take them seriously, which is why the signs emanating from the Biden administration are having serious ramifications.

Charlie Brown, in Charles Schultz’s “Peanuts” cartoon, has given us his definition of happiness. Charlie says, “Happiness is a warm puppy or happiness is winning an argument with your sister or happiness is knowing the right answer in school.” Venturing a step further, I would say that happiness is graduation.

Thanks to the beneficence of the Internal Revenue Service -- and the fallout from COVID-19 -- we half of Americans who pay federal income taxes have been given until May 17 to file.

The Central Intelligence Agency is always looking to recruit new agents, and advertising is one way it has done so in the past. The difference this time is in a newly created series of recruitment videos that reflects the spirit of the age in which we live, rather than appealing to abilities and patriotism.

President Joe Biden has just completed his first 100 days in the White House, and marked the occasion by addressing a joint session of Congress on April 28.

There are those of y’all who will say that this should have been written a long ways back. I don’t disagree. But the courtly Terry Kay knew how fine a man he was and would have been embarrassed for me to proclaim it to a million people.

In 1957, Mama and Daddy gathered up their simple belongings, those which they had carefully acquired through the diligent saving of nickels, and moved to the little brick house they had built.

A man in his 40s gave up his work to go back to school to become a minister of music. His wife surrendered her tasks as PTA president and church organist. The family of five began to prepare to move out of the community. Local people couldn’t understand it, and one of them said to him, “It must have taken great faith to give up what you had and make a fresh start this far along life’s way.”

The contrast between President Biden's first address to Congress last Wednesday night and the Republican response delivered by Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) reminded me of another occasion between one long-winded and another profound speaker.

The state of Virginia, which used to be reliably red and mostly conservative, is providing more evidence of an increasingly blue and liberal hue.

The late Helmut Thielicke, noted German theologian and pastor, said that a few years ago he wanted to give one of his books a title. He wanted to call it “Church and Public.” But his publisher objected. “The Church,” his publisher stated, “doesn’t catch the public eye. Please choose another title. I’d rather not publish a flop.”

When I was one year out of college, I said goodbye to my small-town newspaper job, packed my bags, and toted them to Washington, D.C.

"Power to the People" was a chant used by anti-war and civil rights protesters in the '60s. John Lennon wrote a song with that title in 1971. The idea flowed from the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution which begins, "We the people."

A well-known minister observed that people are so uptight today that they can no longer sleep in church.

This is the second installment in a two-part series on the military career of Cesar “Rico” Rodrequez.

A handful of friends and I had a significant birthday coming which brought forth a range of emotions from each.

The guilty verdict against former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin on all counts was correct, based on the evidence, but the theatrics leading up to that trial and after the jurors had made their decision were outrageous.

The first question most people ask after mass shootings like the one last week at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis in which a 19-year-old male murdered eight people before taking his own life is "how did he get the gun?" He was known to authorities. A gun he previously owned was seized because he was believed to have mental problems.

Upon the tragic death of a friend, Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote the poem “In Memoriam.” For a long time, Tennyson blamed God for the accident.

President Biden's announced intention to complete the withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Afghanistan by Sept. 11, exactly 20 years after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, will complete a goal former President Trump wanted to meet, but did not, following advice from military leaders, who convinced him that a May 1 deadline was a bad idea.

If one can say the pandemic has had any positive side effect, it has been to help us focus on what the loss of liberties looks like.

There it hung, solemnly, in all its glory on my grandmother’s kitchen wall. It was something to be proud of, and each month that she paid a few dollars to the Standard Phone Company, she was, indeed, proud.

Cesar “Rico” Rodriguez described his youthful home as, “Where we unpacked our luggage.” An admitted military brat, Rodriguez was born in El Paso, Texas, at Ft. Bliss, the son of a career Army soldier. He recalled, “My father was Puerto Rican and my mother was Cuban. We spent a lot of time in…

Back in the day when "Saturday Night Live" was funny, Chevy Chase would open the "Weekend Update" segment by saying, "I'm Chevy Chase ... and you're not."

A man suffered a shattering experience in which all of his world seemed to collapse. However, he didn’t give up the struggle and finally came out on top. Someone asked him how he had managed to make it through and he answered simply, “I had a friend.”

Our friendship goes back to high school. We were roommates, straight out of college. We were bridesmaids in each other’s wedding. She knows the worst of me and, usually, finds it funny rather than off-putting.

When the NFL decided not to punish players who kneeled during the pre-game national anthem, some fans reacted by refusing to attend games, buy league merchandise, or watch games on TV.