This has always been the way of presidential politics. The president rises above the fray while his surrogates go on the attack. They throw the spears and fling the mud; he sits upon the throne.

As a matter of policy, increasing taxes on the most economically productive group, which already generates 60 percent of the nation's federal revenues, during a sustained period of economic doldrums is a wretched idea.

As a member of the Mormon church, Romney is instructed to tithe 10 percent of his income. That's in keeping with most charitable giving: Religious institutions get about one-third of all contributions, according to 'The American' magazine.

There's no light at the end of the tunnel in the Republican message, no promise of better things to come. There's only the present stagnation, followed by a slow decline.

Electoral contests have nothing but polls, which is why people have grown so obsessed with them; we're desperate for an objective rendering of what is happening and what may happen.

Insulting the electorate and accusing it of spiritual weakness and sinfulness are not the ways to get yourself the job of president.

Christopher Nolan's astounding third Batman feature, 'The Dark Knight Rises,' represents the true maturation of the superhero movie - and provides the key to understanding the bottomless craving moviegoers have for these films, 34 years after the Christopher Reeve Superman gave birth to the genre.