When I started both this column and our now nine-year-old polling and political electronic news firm, I swore off partisan politics. I don’t campaign for candidates and don’t really care who wins any particular race. I have to treat politicians like a proctologist treats, well, nevermind ...

Let’s have a show of hands by people who are fed up with the way politics is practiced in America. Activists, party operatives, media guest bookers interested in conflict, not resolution of problems and all fund-raisers, put your hands down. The rest of you pay attention.

If the pen is indeed mightier than the sword, then there should be no problem establishing a new writers’ group in Senoia; at least, that’s what I thought. Starting a writers’ group seems the next logical step on the road to becoming a published author. Who knew that road would be so arduous?

Humorous Mike Huckabee has become the sum of all fears for many members of the GOP establishment. Some of the attacks arise out of plain old Christophobia, and Huckabee can’t do much about that. But some come from concern that he’s a Christian-only candidate: On these matters he can take lessons from Samuel Adams and Patrick Henry.

“What’s with the difference in all the clergy, the different colored shirts they wear, the crosses, and the ‘plus’ signs?”

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you, uh, thank… please, save your appl…ap….

Please, ladies and gentlemen, friends… Please… It’s not what you think. Plea…

Answers to your questions about life, religion and the Bible

Pastors get some of the darnedest, most interesting questions from people in their churches and people they meet. Here are a few that I’ve gotten over the years of my ministry and via email since this column started.

Thanksgiving is supposed to be about gratitude and Christmas about ... what? Getting more stuff we don’t really need, but sometimes selfishly want?

The U.S. housing market is hurting, as you undoubtedly know. Home foreclosures are the highest since record-keeping began 35 years ago. 1.69 percent of all outstanding mortgage loans have entered the foreclosure process. The median price of an American house in October 2007 has fallen more than $20,000 this year.

The world became a more dangerous place this week with the assassination of Benazir Bhutto in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

The country, a linchpin in the war on terrorism, is wracked with violence, endangering not just Pakistanis but all of us. If Islamic fundamentalists are able to exploit the current chaos and gain control of the government — an unspeakable but not inconceivable possibility — we will be faced with a nuclear-armed enemy rather than one that relies on suicide belts and roadside bombs.

About a month ago I received a letter from Evelyn Fitzgerald Hyde of Buford who is writing a book about the Hyde family of Coweta County. Evelyn was seeking an obituary on a Maurice Herman Hyde, born 23 April 1931, who had died recently and was from Coweta County.

As the year ends, I would like to make a few observations. These conclusions are, of course, only my opinion, but, since this is an opinion column, it seems appropriate. Others, thanks be to the American culture and to the United States Constitution, are free to agree, disagree, or totally ignore them.

In the Atheist Age — the age of Richard Dawkins, Philip Pullman and others whose verbal assaults on God bedeck the best-seller lists — it might seem barren to celebrate a stable, a star and a baby, these being the central figures of Christmas.

So I like to eat, lie around and not exercise. Is that a crime?

Nope, but my doctor said it’s unhealthy. He told me to get an exercise plan, lose weight and get back into shape.

Apparently there is nobody among either the Democrats or the Republicans who is going to cause a runaway stampede like that which toppled all the Republican front-runners in 1940, when the convention delegates began loudly chanting “We want Wilkie!”

One of the traits of a cult is its refusal to consider any evidence that might disprove the faith. And so it is doubtful the global warming cultists will be moved by 400 scientists, many of whom, according to the Washington Times, “are current or former members of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that shares the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with Mr. Gore for publicizing a climate crisis.”

[Provided by the Georgia Public Policy Foundation]

The following are excerpts from an interview with the Honorable Clarence Thomas, an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court since 1991, about his new book: “My Grandfather’s Son: A Memoir.”

Last year as New Year’s approached, a reporter called and asked for my resolutions for the upcoming year for a story she was doing.

All the hosts of heaven, it seemed, were jostling and pushing their way toward the Great Hall of Justice. The commotion frightened a young angel caught up in the crowd.

I know there are two sides to every story, but the way this Bobby Petrino exit from the Atlanta Falcons came across reminds us that, as our mothers told us growing up, honesty is always the best policy.

His name isn’t yet familiar to most Americans, but I expect it will be by the end of 2008: Jose A. Rodriguez Jr. He is the man, according to recent press reports, who ordered the destruction of interrogation tapes made by the CIA, which allegedly show the effects of waterboarding and other “enhanced interrogation techniques” used against terrorists Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri.

Move over, Martin Luther King Jr., and your desire for a colorblind society. The University of California system prefers a color-coordinated one.

Here’s a Christmas story that might make you cry, but not for sentimental reasons. The town of Great Barrington, Mass., population 7,000, has ordered a curfew on “holiday” lights this season because of global warming.

I know there are two sides to every story, but the way this Bobby Petrino exit from the Atlanta Falcons came across reminds us that, as our mothers told us growing up, honesty is always the best policy. Obviously, I was not within earshot of previous conversations between Petrino and Falcons owner Arthur Blank before his infamous December 11 resignation from the Falcons and subsequent joining the Arkansas Razorbacks as head coach hours later. So I don’t who said what.

There is an article in the current issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education — the trade publication of the academic world — about professors being physically intimidated by their students.

I’ve just now figured it out — the right conservative candidate for these confused and disturbing times. I’m voting for Barry Goldwater, and nothing can stop me. Save — I admit — the inconvenience of Barry’s residence in a venue other than the land of the living.

Every three years, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) conducts its Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). PISA is a set of tests that measure 15-year-olds’ performance in mathematics, science and reading.

When The Wife was in third grade, her parents gave her a special birthday present. Usually receiving birthday gifts from your parents isn’t all that unusual, but this gift certainly was. A peel-and-stick puzzle of the United States. Each state had a removable capital and a symbol of the main export. Georgia’s capital is Atlanta, and our symbol is peaches.

It asks for miraculous powers of revision to not see a show on television at night and satisfy ourselves that by abiding by the protocols of collective bargaining we are fighting for the survival of essential American rights. The law is an ass, a humbug, if it is defined by the number of people whose rights are being affirmed by neglecting them entirely.

My family engaged in a tradition this past weekend. We celebrated “cookie day.” It’s not on the calendar, of course, but it is an annual event nonetheless. My wife’s birthday is Dec. 18 and, a few years ago after the grandchildren started to arrive, she decided that, on or near her birthday, the family would have Cookie Day. That’s the only gift she wants from the kids — bring the grandchildren to Cookie Day.