Commentary, editorials and opinion, opinions

EAST HADDAM, Conn. - Jack Crawford, my maternal grandfather, didn't use the telephone. It annoyed him. He did his palavering face to face. He never learned to drive, either, saying he didn't want to be bothered putting the damned thing in the garage at night. Nor was Jack big on television. He read books, by Shakespeare, Dickens and that lot.

When the California Legislature's Democratic leaders staged a vainglorious debate on the state budget Tuesday -- the last official day of the biennial session --Republicans derided it, accurately, as a meaningless political drill.

In a rare show of bipartisanship last month, Congress approved a $600 million border-security bill to help cut off the flow of illegal immigrants.

Despite the tenth of a percent increase in the unemployment rate last month to 9.6, there was actually some good news in the latest U.S. Department of Labor figures.

Americans are an industrious people. They like to work. And they are unhappy when they can't -- as shown with the unrest over the current 9 percent-plus unemployment, a rate many countries would take in a second.

The habits of work are deeply ingrained in our national DNA, as this Labor Day reflection by the U.S. Census bureau shows.

President Obama went on TV the other night to talk about the end of the combat mission in Iraq, and what he did not say is what very few are saying, least of all the ideologically disturbed, facts-rearranging left.

Most Americans don't actively dislike President Obama; they just think he does not know how to bring the economy back to life. And that's why the upcoming elections are going to be riveting.

TEMECULA, Calif. - Amid Labor Day's parades and picnics, union bosses will bellow Monday about workers' rights and the alleged greed of management, especially inside big business. Such class warfare sloganeering would be easier to stomach if big labor were internally consistent.

Has America lost its honor?

WASHINGTON - In the world of cutesy, sound bite politics danger lurks around every corner, especially for those who built their reputations on quick quips or snappy comebacks. More than one career has been sunk by loose lips, particularly in a day when things that used to be funny aren't any more.