Pale

New York --The Democrats are doing an admirable job this year of pretending to be normal humans who can be entrusted with the U.S. Government.In previous conventions, the Democrats have had an unfortunate tendency to come off as a collection of random lunar modules, raving into the TV cameras about issues like vegetable rights. But this year they're wearing suits and adopting moderate positions and appearing to be responsible mainstream middle Americans right up until the TV coverage ends.

The terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, was a tragedy, and four people died. Republicans are sure that Susan Rice and the president are lying about what happened and say they are "not satisfied" with the explanations that were given. But how many American military personnel, contractors and Iraqi citizens have died, and how many more have sustained traumatic, life-changing injuries, because of the lies that got us into the Iraq War? Where is the outrage over that?

PALE, Bosnia-Herzegovina -- The directions to Radovan Karadzic's house are simple: Drive north from town on the road with potholes the size of Land Rovers. Pass a dusty gas station and cross a small bridge over a muddy stream. It's another mile past wandering cows and green meadows filled with buttercups before you see a narrow dirt road on your right.Look for five or six soldiers in camouflage lounging at a small booth. Karadzic's house is just up the lane, in a village of a dozen or so homes at the edge of the woods.

Graphic designer Jon Zerivitz was tired of being stuck at a computer for up to 12 hours a day as a contractor forT. Rowe Price. "I needed a hobby," Zerivitz said. Indulging a longtime passion for beer, he went to the Maryland Homebrew store in Columbia in 2010 and bought everything he needed to brew beer. "The first batch was really good," he recalled. "The second batch was really bad. I kept at it. " Two years later, Zerivitz, 32, was brewing beer again Aug. 3, but on a larger scale, as co-owner of the new Union Craft Brewing Co., on the border of Hampden and Woodberry.

As its title suggests, Lanford Wilson's "Burn This" is fiery stuff. Emotions sizzle, tempers flare and the language is strewn with enough profanity to spontaneously ignite. In the intimate confines of Fells Point Corner Theatre, this impassioned work, directed by Steve Goldklang, all but singes you."Burn This" is about the heat that's generated when opposites attract, and the chill that engulfs people who hide from the truth, or pretend they're something they're not.The chief conflict concerns a dancer from a privileged background who is attracted -- like a moth to a flame -- to the unstable, crude older brother of her recently deceased dancing partner and roommate.

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina -- Sharp dissent emerged at the U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo yesterday over the Clinton administration's decision to change its policy and engage in direct negotiations with the Bosnian Serbs despite their rejection of an international peace plan.The dissent centered on what one official described as attempts by the State Department to oust the U.S. ambassador to Bosnia, Victor Jackovich, who has always opposed direct talks with the Bosnian Serbs until they accept the peace plan.

How to tell the difference between Penn and Teller: Penn is taller and Teller is paler. In public, Penn is talky and Teller is . . ."Excuse me, Teller is very pale, he is a bit paler than I. Neither one of us has ever been in the sun. Right now we are in a room with no windows, rehearsing the 'Penn & Teller Refrigerator Tour.' It is a schoolroom, like Michigan architects design to drive little children crazy . . . They graduate and they never have seen the sun. . . ."Am I surprised when people ask me why our tour is called the 'Refrigerator Tour'?

"Burn This," Lanford Wilson's intense comedy-drama packed with some hilarious moments, is on stage at the Fells Point Corner Theatre weekends through Nov. 25.This production is first-rate, outstanding theatrical entertainment. Directed with style and panache by Steve Goldklang, the four-character play deals with New York urban sophisticates embroiled in an odd love triangle. The dialogue is crisp and slick, funny, often moving and never boring.In his way, Wilson has written an old-fashioned movie romance updated to the contemporary scene.

She faints. She coughs. She recovers. She faints. She coughs. She dies. Oh, and her frailty inspires lust in the man who revives her. They fall in love. Her name is Mimi, and, as the heroine of "La Boheme" takes to the stage in the Baltimore Opera's performances of Puccini's 19th-century opera, some in the audience can't help but ask a few technical questions. For instance, why is Rodolfo hanging around Mimi as she wastes away in the final death scene? Doesn't he realize she's contagious?

WHEN 350 heavily armed British and Czech soldiers, supported by United States helicopter gunships, invaded and disarmed six Bosnian Serb police stations in Banja Luka on Wednesday, they accomplished several things. The most decisive was dismembering the little Bosnian Serb republic of Srpska into two fiercely rival enclaves.In northern Bosnia, Biljana Plavsic is recognized as president, though without loyal forces. The other enclave is centered on Pale in eastern Bosnia, where the former president and indicted war criminal, Radovan Karadzic, rules as undisputed boss.

Two women who had just had dinner robbed by a man who implied he had a gun outside a French bistro in Roland Park. Police swarm the neighborhood. Baltimore's top cop calls the victims directly and orders a commander to visit the restaurant to calm fears. Too much attention from both the media and the cops? The victim thinks so. Sally Michel, who heads the board of directors of the Parks & People Foundation and is a well-known political insider in city politics, called to complain.

Certainly there have been worse transactions in the history of sports. Take your pick: The Red Sox selling Babe Ruth so they could finance a Broadway musical. The Baltimore Colts forcibly dumping pouty Sanford rookie QB John Elway for Mark Hermann and a couple of offensive linemen. The Dodgers trading promising Pedro Martinez for second baseman Delino DeShields. But somewhere down the line, in the zip-zip world of stock car racing, comes this one: Dale Earnhardt Jr. for Kyle Busch.

In reference to your recent op-ed piece on the vandalism perpetrated against several Chicago-area funeral homes last month ("Big Labor shows its ugly side," Aug. 8), I would suggest some perspective is in order. Flunkies from Big Business almost shut down the United States government. Flunkies from Big Labor vandalized three funeral homes in Chicago. Toenail fungus is ugly but cancer will kill you. David Ingalls, Severna Park

"So many people have condemned the play for its sordid theme," Vivien Leigh said in a 1950s interview about Tennessee Williams' "A Streetcar Named Desire," the vehicle for one of her most indelible achievements as an actress. "To me it is an infinitely moving plea for tolerance for all weak, frail creatures, blown about like leaves before the wind of circumstance." That plea seemed more affecting than ever as the Sydney Theatre Company's production of "Streetcar" unfolded Saturday night at the Kennedy Center, with Cate Blanchett inhabiting the central role of Blanche DuBois.

I like this government report saying that more Americans than before are reading novels and short stories - 113 million, in fact. Fiction is my cash crop, and that's good news. Too bad, though, that the report was issued by the National Endowment for the Arts. A deep-down aversion to art is one big reason half of America stays away from fiction. They're afraid they'll come across a sentence like, "She looked out the window and saw the reflection of her own pale face against the drifted snow."

Will it ever end? For more than a year, the financial system has struggled to function, stricken as it is with economic Ebola. Cash is the only cure, and banks have raised almost $400 billion. That's not nearly enough, however, so the federal government has committed to various bailouts that will cost hundreds of billions over time. The most expensive yet - a new super-agency to buy bad debt - may eventually cost north of $1 trillion. As bad as the situation is, we're in deeper trouble than most realize.

Bravo. Bravissimo. Michael Tabrizi cooks beautifully, th rooms of the ex-Soup Kitchen glow gracefully, the waiters wait attentively and intelligently, and the casually dressed, chic clientele look like they love it all. We loved it, twice, two nights in a row.The first night, of course, we didn't know what we were in for, until we passed the open kitchen in the entryway, smelled the glorious smells, and stared in at a refrigerated display case holding a...

PALE, Bosnia-Herzegovina -- Stuck in Belgrade, the Serbian capital about 150 miles from his own Bosnian Serb capital here, Jovan Zametica, a principal adviser to Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, was begging for a ride."

Once thought of as only helping develop strong bones, vitamin D is now believed to serve many purposes in the human body. A deficiency of the vitamin has been linked to several diseases and disorders. Yet most people don't get enough of the so-called "sunshine vitamin." For years, Americans have been taught that as summer approaches, they should reach for sunscreen to protect themselves from a scorching burn - and the skin cancer it might trigger. But new research shows that by covering up, they may be sacrificing important vitamin D, which is made by the skin when it's exposed to sunlight.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- The rumors were flying around the backstretch barns yesterday morning. Big Brown, the favorite for today's 134th Kentucky Derby, was having foot problems, and trainer Rick Dutrow was being slow to answer questions about the horse's feet. But over at the Dutrow barn, Big Brown was out in front of his stable having a bath. Looking unconcerned. And there beside him was Dutrow, showing his usual smiley face. "Have you checked his hooves today?" he was asked. "Of course," he said.