All of my life I’ve been able to eat anything I wanted, anytime I wanted, and as much as I wanted. Well, not any more.

Devotees of this column will hopefully give us a little “gold star” for having caught wind of the “Draft Fred Thompson” movement long before most media knew of it.

Odd names have always fascinated me. First names, last names, it doesn't matter, just odd names that take some thinking to learn to spell.

As a general rule, candidate endorsements in political campaigns are both over-reported and overrated.

Think about it: When was the last time you, or anybody either of us knows, said, “I fully intended to vote for John Kerry for president until my lieutenant governor endorsed George W. Bush and made me change my mind.”

The eerie Kabuki dance that is Iraq is about to enter a new phase where death is the only certainty. The Democratic Party is hell-bent on pulling out of the desert killing fields, while the Bush administration is trying to buy time with an aggressive push against the murderous “insurgents.”

Devotees of this column will hopefully give us a little “gold star” for having caught wind of the “Draft Fred Thompson” movement long before most media knew of it.

“Don’t you think — because of that program — society benefits?” an actor friend of mine asked me recently. She referred to a taxpayer-provided health care program that she “turned to” during one of the many “down periods” during her career.

WASHINGTON — Hillary Rodham Clinton’s presidential campaign hints that agreeing to refrain from campaigning in outlaw Florida and Michigan primaries is a noble sacrifice bowing to party rules.

Sometimes we find guts in strange places, and cowardice where there should be strength.

Last month’s largest cowardice report came from The Netherlands, where a Catholic bishop said that Christian-Muslim animosity could be reduced through one simple measure: “Shouldn’t we all say that from now on we will call God Allah?”

Some set the matter aside as being nothing more than verbal play for the benefit of word-men. What term properly designates what we are doing, and what we are enduring, in many parts of the world, the symbolic center of which is the Twin Towers site in Manhattan?

Here’s a peculiar thing about the holier-than-thou Campaign Finance Reform crowd.

Whenever the stench of dirty money starts wafting from Democrat Party coffers, the clean election lobbyists are nowhere to be found.

Economic theory does not operate in a vacuum. Institutions, such as the property rights structure, determine how the theory manifests itself. Similarly, the law of gravity isn’t repealed when a parachutist floats gently down to earth. The parachute simply affects how the law of gravity manifests itself.

So, now (or just about now) — Fred Thompson, Republican candidate for president! As Jack Benny replied when the stickup man gave him the choice of his money or his life, “... I’m thinking.”

During the first 30 years of my life, I had no health insurance. Neither did a lot of other people, back in those days.

My good friends, Mary Jean "M.T." and Glen Allen met the year I moved to Georgia, 1959. They were employed at the Atlanta airport, Glen as an air traffic controller and M.T. as a teletype operator for Delta Air Lines.

Ah, the books saved for the occasion. CDs stacked in easy reach. The laptop sharing a bolstered bed with Webster and Bartlett in case the muse should strike, and the promises of catered dinners from about a dozen friends.

In our state judicial system, Fayette County is one of four counties forming the Griffin Judicial Circuit. Commissioner Eric Maxwell is reported as having recently publicly wondered if the time is not ripe for carving a Fayette Judicial Circuit out of the present Griffin Judicial Circuit.

He’s my “go to” guy. He’s the one when all other romantic dalliances nose dive, he’s there to hear the dismal stories and lend a sympathetic ear.

Three preachers were having lunch at the local diner, when one said, “You know, I’m having a lot of trouble with bats in the church attic. I’ve tried everything, but nothing seems to scare them off.”

DUBLIN, Ireland - Britain’s version of Elvis week reached its crescendo Friday with a memorial service marking the 10th anniversary of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales.

Last week, congressional Democrats vowed to investigate Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ firing of himself. Gonzales has said he was not involved in the discussions about his firing and that it was “performance-based,” but he couldn’t recall the specifics.

Three preachers were having lunch at the local diner, when one said, “You know, I’m having a lot of trouble with bats in the church attic. I’ve tried everything, but nothing seems to scare them off.”

Months ago, one of my closest and smartest friends, Georgia House Speaker Pro Tem Mark Burkhalter, told me he was committing to Mitt Romney for president. I told him I didn’t think Romney had a chance. Now I’m starting to think my former colleague and good buddy is graduating to political genius.

WASHINGTON — One day after Alberto Gonzales submitted his resignation as attorney general and two days before it was made public, White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten was on the phone Saturday feeling out who might be available as a replacement.

London’s Times Online recently reported that, according to Vatican sources, Pope Benedict XVI is working on his second encyclical, a doctrinal pronouncement that will condemn tax evasion as “socially unjust.” (See www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article2237625.ece.)

No trade-offs?

A whole nation following the tragedy of a mine cave-in in Utah was struck by the further tragedy of another cave-in at the same mine, killing men who had gone underground to try to rescue the miners trapped there.

The dog days of August have drawn to a close. This is the calm before the gathering political storm.

On Sept. 15, the far-left group ANSWER (“Act Now to Stop War and End Racism”) will descend on the nation’s capital to demand what they’ve been demanding for the last six years in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks: immediate withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan; immediate closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility and immediate release of every last suspected al Qaeda operative in American custody; immediate impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney; and immediate capitulation to our enemies at home and abroad.

The most recent initiative of the president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, is to change Venezuela’s time zone by one half-hour. Why? There is only one reasonable answer: to annoy the United States.

With the continuing stampede by the states of Michigan, South Carolina, Florida and whatever jurisdiction is next to fast-forward its own presidential primary dates to early January 2008, the nation risks losing a lot more than the reflective judgment of the voters in the traditional first-in-the-nation states of Iowa and New Hampshire.

There is something more than a little bizarre with the latest Washington feeding frenzy over Sen. Larry Craig.

Don’t get me wrong. I think what Sen. Craig did in the men’s bathroom in Minneapolis was gross and sleazy. But is it really worthy of the press attention it has received this week?