Nation

KIGALI, Rwanda -- American jets and Ethiopian forces recently conducted strikes in Somalia in support of that nation's fledgling democratic government. The event received passing notice in the United States, but to those of us working in East Africa, and specifically in Rwanda, it was cause for optimism. It demonstrated the willingness of Ethiopia and Somalia to put aside past differences and unite against radical Islamists who threaten both. It suggested that an era of thinking and acting regionally may have arrived in East Africa.

HIDDEN among the sordid details of sex, lies and videotape, the president's impeachment and trial pointed up the miserably low standing of intellectuals in American life.Congress and the media treated experts with scorn. The nation ignored its scholars, viewing their research as irrelevant technicalities or partisan propaganda.When Yale Law School Professor Bruce A. Ackerman testified that the Constitution forbid a lame-duck House from sending articles of impeachment to a newly elected Senate, the Judiciary Committee dismissed his contention without a second thought.

THE ALMIGHTY dollar faces a rival in financial transactions. The euro exists, though you cannot see it. The currencies of Austria, Belgium Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain still circulate, but were glued together on New Year's Day.Each took a fixed rate of exchange to a unit of account called the euro. Control over their supply and interest rates passed from each nation's central bank to the European Central Bank in Frankfurt. They are really one currency; they just look different.

ON WEDNESDAY, when South Africans go to the polls for their second nationwide democratic election, their country will start learning the answer to the question that has been asked for more than five years: What happens after Mandela?From the moment Nelson Mandela walked out of Victor Verster prison near Cape Town in 1990, his ascension to the leadership of whatever nation emerged from the ruins of apartheid seemed certain. When he not only lived up to but surpassed the image of Nelson Mandela constructed by his supporters during his 27 years in prison, his presidency of the new government became inevitable.

THIS holiday season is preparing us to enter a new century. It is a time for reflection on who we are as a nation, what we stand for as a people and how we want to shape the century to come.It is a time when we are challenged to become our best selves. So I am saddened when I experience the holiday season only reinforcing our identity as consumers.There has been a shift in our sense of self. Prior to the 1980s, most of us would probably have identified ourselves as citizens. We felt responsible for the welfare of each other.

THE ALMIGHTY dollar faces a rival in financial transactions. The euro exists, though you cannot see it. The currencies of Austria, Belgium Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain still circulate, but were glued together on New Year's Day.Each took a fixed rate of exchange to a unit of account called the euro. Control over their supply and interest rates passed from each nation's central bank to the European Central Bank in Frankfurt. They are really one currency; they just look different.

Gerald Ford has offered to pardon President Clinton. He had to be reminded that he's no longer president, and, in fact, he really never was.Now what? Members of Congress get you all worked up and then nothing happens -- they're no better than Bill Clinton.The open-ended, expanded investigation is rumored to be looking at Bill Clinton's activities at Boy's Nation -- in the photograph of a young Mr. Clinton with President Kennedy, a little girl with big hair from the trailer park down the road is clearly visible.

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Just a few days ago this nation of more than 200 million was bracing for the worst: mass bloodshed in the capital and perhaps civil war.Expatriates who had not already fled Jakarta poured into the airport desperate to escape. Hotels warned guests, some of whom had left their homes because of earlier violence, to draw their curtains and stay away from the windows.Opponents of then-President Suharto planned a demonstration of up to 1 million people on Wednesday, just days after rioting had left more than 500 dead.

No. 4 Florida State (10-1) vs. No. 9 Ohio State (10-2)Site: New OrleansTime: 8: 30 p.m. todayTV: ABCLine: Florida State by 6 1/2Coaches: Bobby Bowden (206-50-3); John Cooper (86-31-4)Outlook: The Seminoles, whose national title hopes disappeared a 32-29 regular-season-ending loss to Florida, are extremely talented on both sides of the ball. DL Andre Wadsworth, the Atlantic Coast Conference Player of the Year, and LB Sam Cowart are first team All-Americans who lead a unit that ranked first in the nation against the run, allowing just 1.5 yards per rush.

MADISON, Wis. -- Is there a place left in the world for the left-leaning press? Here, in this university town and state capital, liberal intellectuals are still keeping the faith at the Progressive, a monthly magazine nearing its 90th birthday.The candles are still burning, too, at the Nation, the New York weekly that finds itself at the last stop on the left side of the political spectrum now that the New Republic, once a champion of liberal causes, has shifted dramatically to the right.

If those Black Friday sales in November didn't seem as sweet as you expected, here's proof: Government data show consumer prices were much higher in Baltimore-Washington that month, compared with November 2007, than in the nation as a whole. Clothing, in particular, showed few signs of markdowns. Nationally, apparel prices were flat compared with the previous November, suggesting that retailers were eager to move the merchandise with deals. But in the Baltimore-Washington region, apparel prices soared 6.3 percent during the same period.

A black nanny holding a porcelain-skinned infant patiently awaits her mistress' return outside a store in Charleston, S.C. Her stoic expression suggests the stranger snapping pictures, like the child in her arms, is one more burden to be endured. Robert Frank captured this poignant image in the late 1950s while traveling around the country. The Swiss-born photographer later included it in his book The Americans, which appeared exactly 50 years ago and is now the subject of a major exhibition at the National Gallery of Art in Washington.

KIGALI, Rwanda -- American jets and Ethiopian forces recently conducted strikes in Somalia in support of that nation's fledgling democratic government. The event received passing notice in the United States, but to those of us working in East Africa, and specifically in Rwanda, it was cause for optimism. It demonstrated the willingness of Ethiopia and Somalia to put aside past differences and unite against radical Islamists who threaten both. It suggested that an era of thinking and acting regionally may have arrived in East Africa.

On that surreal morning in September when lawmakers milled aimlessly about the Capitol grounds in a kind of stupor - images of airline attacks on New York replaying in their brains and the stench of the burning Pentagon in their nostrils - Nebraska Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel made an observation that would become an instant clich?. The nation, he said, "is forever changed." Five years later, the metamorphosis is still under way but so far not much seems to have changed for the better. Most damaged is the national psyche.

Numbers-- The U.S. reported the nation's March unemployment rate fell to 4.7 percent from February's 4.8 percent, matching its lowest point in 4 1/2 years.

Numbers-- The nation's unemployment rate dropped from 4.9 percent to 4.7 percent, the lowest since July 2001, the Labor Department reported last week.

PHILADELPHIA -- The bedraggled teenager had just arrived in Philadelphia, a young boomtown in 1723 compared with old, established Boston, the city of his birth. He had little money, few clothes and no friends here. As he walked by a young woman standing in her father's doorway, she thought he made "a most awkward, ridiculous appearance." The 17-year-old wandered the streets, eating a loaf of bread, until he saw a group of well-dressed people walking with purpose. He followed them into the main Quaker meetinghouse and sat down.

WASHINGTON -- Well, I guess that settles that. "We do not torture," said President Bush on Monday. Never mind all those torture pictures from Abu Ghraib. Never mind all those torture stories from Guantanamo Bay. Never mind the 2002 Justice Department memo that sought to justify torture. Never mind reports of U.S. officials sending detainees to other countries for torture. Never mind Vice President Dick Cheney lobbying to exempt the CIA from rules prohibiting torture. "We do not torture," said the president.

It should be a national scandal that students from privileged families are 25 times more likely than their less-advantaged peers to attend the nation's top colleges and universities. Little noticed amid the torrent of coverage about the disaster in New Orleans has been the approach of the 40th anniversary tomorrow of a major event in the history of American race relations. President Lyndon B. Johnson, in an act that recognized the deep racial fault lines most recently thrust to the surface by Hurricane Katrina, signed Executive Order 11246, which required federal contractors to take "affirmative action" to ensure equal opportunity.

In 1984, a 30-year-old local news personality left Baltimore's WJZ-TV to try her hand at hosting a morning talk show in a bigger market, Chicago. Within a year, A.M. Chicago was renamed for its new host, and by 1986 it had begun national syndication. Today, The Oprah Winfrey Show marks its 20th anniversary, and its star is one of the most powerful women in the world, a 51-year-old media mogul and billionaire whose influence reaches into nearly every nook and cranny of contemporary life.