Now that the Academy Award nominations have been released, the focus is on which of the nine nominated films will garner the coveted best picture award.  There were few surprises among the nominees for that award, other than that the Coen Brothers’ “Inside Llewyn Davis,” which was widely praised by critics, was shunned.               […]

              The assignment is always difficult, and the year just past was no different.  And so, ten must be expanded to fifteen.  Here, in our normal reverse order, are the best performances we witnessed in and around Sacramento in 2013.               15.  The April performances by Alvin Ailey’s American Dance Theater at the Mondavi Center […]

              With the NFL’s playoff season in full swing, this is the time of the year when baseball should not be making headlines.  Oh, the hot stove league can pop a juicy rumor about a big trade or a free agent signing here and there, but for the most part, January is a month when […]

              “It is hard to conceive that it would take more forces to provide stability in post-Saddam Iraq than it would take to conduct the war itself – hard to imagine.” -Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz (February, 2003)               “The insurgency in Iraq is in its last throes.” -Vice President Dick Cheney (June, 2005) […]