President Obama wisely avoided the phrase "mission accomplished" in his major speech last week about the "war on terror," but columnists aren't obliged to be so circumspect: It is time to declare victory and get on with our lives.

What enemy general who fought in North Carolina is most memorialized here?

Here is a hint. The Charlotte pro basketball team is taking back the Hornets name.

There are various reasons you might not care about the Obama administration's spying on journalist James Rosen and labeling him an "aider and abettor and/or co-conspirator" in an espionage case.

Watching the 1974 version of the film, The Great Gatsby, one feels simultaneously compelled and disgusted by the beautiful people in their gaudy display of wealthy excess and shameless freedom of bad behavior.

I have not seen the video.

Not saying I won't, but for now, I've chosen not to. To rush online and seek out cellphone footage of two fanatics with machetes who butchered a British soldier in London on Wednesday, to watch them standing there, hands painted red with his blood, speaking for the cameras, would feel like an act of complicity, like giving them what they want, like being a puppet yanked by its strings

Women's reproductive rights have enjoyed a half-century or so of well-defined proponents and opponents, but the recently flourishing fertility industry, from egg harvesting to surrogacy, has produced fresh and surprising alliances among former foes.

"Horrible customer service." That's what the newly fired IRS commissioner averred was the agency's only sin in singling out conservative political groups for discriminatory treatment.

Barack Obama, vowing to elevate Washington to the level of his fastidiousness, came from Chicago, where the political machine inoculates itself from scandals by the proliferation of them: Many scandals mean merely cursory scrutiny of most. Now, notice the scant attention being given to an assault on civil liberties by the misconceived Education Department's misnamed Office for Civil Rights.

Mark Carson was shot in the face because he’s gay.

His alleged killer, 33-year old Elliot Morales, is said to have confronted Carson, 32, and a companion, in New York’s Greenwich Village last Friday night, yelling antigay slurs.

When Carson walked away, Morales reportedly followed and shot him. Morales was arrested by police after a foot chase.

In pondering this tragedy, it is worthwhile to consider a couple things: where it happened, and when.

President Obama should spend his remaining years in office making the United States part of the solution to climate change, not part of the problem. If Congress sticks to its policy of obstruction and willful ignorance, Obama should use his executive powers to the fullest extent. We are out of time.

With each breath, every person alive today experiences something unique in human history: an atmosphere containing more than 400 parts per million of carbon dioxide. This makes us special, I suppose, but not in a good way.

Yesterday I read an interesting article in Newsweek about the connection between tornadoes and climate change.

Newsweek's story explained how top climate scientists were concerned about several ominous and fundamental changes occurring in Earth's weather patterns.

You have to hand it to North Carolina’s Republican Senators. They relish going, as Star Trek proclaimed, “Where no man has gone before.” They appear to enjoy painting bull’s-eyes on themselves, daring feedback. We admire their boldness and courage but their tax reform proposals and recently passed budget deserve closer deliberation.

They were the speak-no-evil and see-no-evil duo of the Internal Revenue Service.

Lois Lerner, who runs the IRS office that targeted tea party and similar conservative groups for extra scrutiny, took the Fifth, when she appeared Wednesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Douglas Shulman, who was running the IRS when the abuses occurred, would have been wise to do the same.

Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger’s office issued a press release last Sunday night about the Senate budget, a few hours before the actual budget itself was online for reporters and citizens to read.

When it comes to who should be the ultimate decision maker and most accountable for a child’s education, the answer is not only obvious, but has been reaffirmed year after year: a strong majority of voters believe parents should ultimately have the decision making power regarding how to best educate a child, according to a recent Survey USA poll. That’s accountability at its best.

Unfortunately, not every parent can access the school that may work best for their child. For example, wealthy parents exercise their ability to choose by moving to an area with good traditional public schools or paying for private school. Interestingly, no one seems to question the wealthy parent’s judgment in sending their child to a private school or highly scrutinizes the quality of that private school. But when legislation is crafted to assist low-income and working-class families with similar options, public education is suddenly on the brink of disaster!