Jerusalem is a festival and a lamentation. Its song is a sigh across the ages, a delicate, robust, mournful psalm at the great junction of spiritual cultures.

Obama behaves like a centrist who leans tentatively left on certain social programs but boldly right on military force and civil liberties.

Caricatures created by politics never fit comfortably into the Oval Office.

Watching foreign affairs is sometimes like watching a magician; the eye is drawn to the hand performing the dramatic flourishes, leaving the other hand - the one doing the important job - unnoticed.

Officers are taught to use all the tricks and lies that courts permit within the scope of the Fifth Amendment's shield against self-incrimination.

Affairs of state tend to drive most presidents toward the center on both foreign and domestic policy, no matter where on the political spectrum they begin, and especially so in the areas of intelligence and law enforcement.

If you stand with the Customs and Border Protection officers who staff the passport booths at Dulles airport near the nation's capital, their task seems daunting.