In warfare, it’s generally not a good idea to prepare for the last war. With hurricanes, this time at least, the opposite was true.

Federal, state and local disaster officials spent the weekend preparing for Hurricane Gustav as if the…

Call it a deadline, a horizon, a timeline, a time frame or an “aspirational timetable.” Whatever the label, Iraq and the United States finally have agreed on a date by which the United States will have pulled all of its troops…

Trailer for Oliver Stone film set for release this fall.

I have previously translated Arabic al-Jazeera articles (and comments) in order to give readers of The Platform some idea of how the election is being followed around the world. Despite some alarming stories about what’s happened to other bloggers who have…

Philosophers long have pondered what separates humans from the great apes with whom we share 95 percent or more of our DNA.
Is it the ability to make and use tools? To remember the past and plan for the future?…

If religion were not so entwined in American politics, there would be little controversy about federal aid to faith-based charities.
Does anyone doubt that the Salvation Army does good in the world? Or Catholic Charities? Or Lutheran Family and Children’s…

Anyone who has moved out of a home knows the embarrassment of cleaning out the basement and the attic, hauling years of accumulated junk into the light of day, wondering why that sofa or lamp ever seemed like a good…

THICKBURGERS AS
HEALTH FOOD

Once upon a time, kiddies, there was no such thing as a 1,420-calorie, 107-fat-gram fast-food hamburger. You couldn’t get a 900-calorie breakfast burrito.

Then came the Hardee’s restaurant chain, originator of what’s been dubbed “fast-food porn,” and…

The Senate this week is expected to give final passage to an overhaul of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The bill restores some measure of the privacy protections that the Bush administration trashed — even as it helps cover…