Growing up in the Midwest, I was very close to my maternal grandmother, who, as a young widow running a small business in 1920s Kansas City, had known firsthand the old Pendergast regime and its classic combine of politics and organized crime.

Venissa is a perfect destination for day-trippers from Venice proper who are searching for great food and a little adventure; it's a 30-minute jaunt by vaporetto from St. Mark's, quicker by water taxi.

I had worked in politics with Johnson and Nixon before becoming a historian and biographer. I kept discovering these dirtier, murkier threads in American politics that led back to Vegas' gambling interests and criminal connections.

I would have to say that Richard Nixon is probably the most gifted and skilled political practitioner, in his pre-presidential years, of all of the American presidents in the 20th century.

While the political debate over abortion will continue for a very long time, the federal government can and should be doing more to support programs and services that provide women with better options.

If I was to get money, that's the first thing you would get: a '96 Impala.

It has always been the role of government to help solve problems, including and especially health crises. Obesity is a health epidemic across our country, and we have a responsibility as a government and a society to do all we can to promote good nutrition and healthy eating so we can reverse this alarming trend.

I'm pro-business! But business ought to make its own money.