When a politician uses the word 'folks,' we should brace ourselves for the deceit, or worse, that is coming.

If a child from an Amazonian hunter-gatherer tribe comes to Boston, is raised in Boston, that child will be indistinguishable in language capacities from my children growing up here, and vice versa.

Growing up in the place I did I never was aware of any other option but to question everything.

I don't join the New Atheists. So, for example, I wouldn't have the arrogance to lecture some mother who hopes to see her dying child in Heaven - that's none of my business, ultimately. I won't lecture her on the philosophy of science.

Homes and buildings, many of which are old and drafty, eat up 40 percent of the energy America uses. Such inefficiencies perpetuate our reliance on foreign oil, imperiling our national security and increasing our contribution to climate change.

Thus the races, though alike in their physical response to climate, may possibly be different in their mental response because they have approached America by different paths.

I understand the climate we live in and why people are curious. But it's just tough and almost emotionally violent - for anyone, I think - to see your personal life summarized in a sentence.

BP is accused of destroying the wildlife and coastline of America, but if you look back into history, you find that BP did something even worse to America. They gave the world Ayatollah Khomeini.