WASHINGTON, D.C. — With Barack Obama nipping at her heels in Iowa, Hillary Clinton went on the state’s public television Dec. 14 to say: “I’ve been vetted. ... There are no surprises.”

Some GOP conservatives worry that a President Mike Huckabee would be like George W. Bush in domestic policy, not using his constitutional power to restrain government spending; and like Jimmy Carter in foreign policy, not using military power to restrain anti-American forces.

“Virtue” is a word not heard much anymore. One definition of the word is “any admirable quality or attribute; ‘work of great merit.’” If there is any one virtue that is greater than the others, that virtue would, in my opinion, be “humility.”

I need a man. A man who can say “No.” A man who rejects Big Nanny government. A man who thinks being president doesn’t mean playing Santa Claus. A man who won’t panic in the face of economic pain. A man who won’t succumb to media-driven sob stories.

So, why not a woman for president? Why not a black? Why not a sclerotic, left-handed tin-typist from Fargo, N.D. — so long as the individual in question served our national purposes while displaying the all-too-rare attributes of intelligence, judgment, decisiveness and patriotism?

Men have been hunters and gathers since the dawn of time so it should come as no surprise that around tax time, we find we have gathered way too much stuff.

It was front-page news on the Jan. 14 issue of the San Francisco Chronicle that blacks by the tens of thousands have left the San Francisco Bay area since the 1990 census.

I’ve got to hand it to Barack Obama. His team managed to take mangled words from Bill and Hillary Clinton and create an explosive racial divide just in time for some major Southern primaries. I’ll get back to that in a bit.

For latecomers, our daughter Mary has lived in Germany since 1984; she is a pianist who has worked for several opera houses but now is with the Mannheim Opera Company. She lives an interesting life, to say the least.

During his recent trip to Israel, President Bush visited several places that re-affirmed his faith, including Bethlehem and the Sea of Galilee. Then exhibiting far greater faith than believing Jesus could walk on water, he asserted that “peace” could be had between Israel, the Palestinians and her Arab neighbors.

If a woman is truly fortunate, she will know two distinct dating periods in her life. The first will be when she is deemed mature enough and interesting enough to date older men. The second will come when she is declared fun enough and sexy enough to date younger men.

My computer-illiterate husband called me from work the other day. It seems that one of his co-workers got an email warning about a new virus hitting computers everywhere. His co-worker insisted that it was truth and my husband called me to warn me about it.

Come November, voters in several states will not only be picking the next president but deciding whether they want to end a system of racial preferences in public higher education and government hiring and contracting.

Black South Carolina state Sen. Robert Ford (a Democrat), back in February 2007, warned against a 2008 Democratic ticket headed by Sen. Barack Obama.

We finally have conclusive evidence that the national TV networks are completely out of touch with reality. Let me share with you exactly how a series of events led to their inevitable conclusion that Barack Obama was a cinch to win the New Hampshire Democratic Primary, which he didn’t. Hillary Clinton won.

I was surfing the 'Net the other day and stumbled across a blog which caused me great concern. It was on Ancestry.com and was a place where customers and technicians could share information and opinions on different programs offered by Ancestry.com, probably the largest genealogy corporation in the world (The Generations Network, Inc.). I have been a member (subscribed to their services) since 2000, when they were in their infancy, and, for the most part, have been quite satisfied with their performance.

If you are in search of details on financial traffic moving about, paying for all the political ads we come across, plus high living for the traffic cops, go to your computer and try searching for “Federal Election Commission” on the Internet.

A few weeks ago, I asked a female college student, “Do you think women are insane?” Without hesitation she replied, “Oh, absolutely! But men are simple.”

Such is the state of modern society that the U.S. Supreme Court gets the job of deciding how much pain the victim of capital punishment feels — never mind what kind of pain the victim’s victims may have felt.

Some superheroes are born out of necessity; others have heroism thrust upon them. Captain Obvious didn’t arrive from a distant plant, spring forth from the molten core of the earth or cross over from a parallel universe. On New Year’s Eve he was born out of what seemed to be a benign statement made by yours truly: “Honey, you know tomorrow is New Year’s Day.”

This 40th anniversary of the turbulent year 1968 is already starting to spawn nostalgic accounts of that year. We can look for more during this year in articles, books, and TV specials, featuring aging 1960s radicals seeking to relive their youth.

The Lincoln Review, a Washington-based black think tank, published an article titled “What Does the Future Hold for Historically Black Colleges?” in its September/October 2007 edition. It recalled the experiences of Bill Maxwell, a St. Petersburg Times columnist and editorial board member, when in 2004 he took a huge pay cut to teach journalism at Stillman College in Tuscaloosa, Ala.

Friends and family, knowing my passion for words, added several books to my lexicon library last year. And just in the knick of time, I’d say. Two new words – at least new to me, that is – popped up in the press over the holidays and sent me to browse the online reference section.

As the first-time father of a twelfth-grader, I remember getting an education on the economics of high school graduation. It all started in September with senior pictures.

BELFAST, Northern Ireland — Where there are large concentrations of Muslims in England, “no-go” zones are being established and, according to the Rt. Rev. Michael Nazir-Ali, the Church of England’s Bishop of Rochester, non-Muslims who “trespass” in such neighborhoods risk attack.

Manchester, N.H. — Les Biffle remains the most legendary American “pollster” whose name nobody knows. During the 1948 presidential campaign — when literally all the Wise Men of the press corps (there were among the press no acknowledged Wise Women in 1948) had, long before a single vote was cast, named Republican Thomas E. Dewey the winner over Democratic President Harry Truman — Democratic operative Biffle, disguising himself as a butter and egg salesman, traveled throughout the Midwest. Listening only to ordinary voters, he turned out to be the only semi-public figure to correctly predict the historic Truman upset victory.

If you met my cousin, Melissa, you’d like her immediately. You’d be captivated by her porcelain perfect complexion and straight, even teeth. She possesses an enviable lithe, slender body, which is standard loveliness on that side of my family but somehow chose to orphan me.

Our family loves to get together on Sunday evenings and watch the popular television show “Extreme Home Makeover.” There’s no greater thing than to see love in action and people’s lives being changed by kindness.

When the Mitchell Report came out — accusing more than 80 professional baseball players of using performance-enhancing substances — television commentators lectured viewers about “broken trust.” One commentator, in particular, somberly expressed his disappointment.