If you had the opportunity to work with your father, follow in his footsteps — and live next door to him to boot — could you do it?

John McCain has been a politician so long that he has apparently forgotten how to be a soldier. His recent tirade about the military’s gay policy compelled Admiral Mullen to remind him that the military is not a democracy and that it is “incredibly bad precedent” to ask soldiers to vote on policy. Admiral Mullen was dead right. A military commander is not supposed to be a Parliamentarian, he is there to enforce orders, and in wartime these are mostly unpopular orders. Today’s generals are mostly weak and mealy-mouthed, and McCain’s talk only encourages them to make further excuses for failure. Consider Marine General Amos, a generally weak and ineffective commander who claims that lifting the ban will cause him to be even more weak and ineffective. Now, that’s a question for you to debate. If General Amos’ fighting capacity or his ability to be an effective soldier is in any way weakened by gays in the military, it’s a strong indication that he wasn’t much of a soldier to begin with.  Somehow, I can’t imagine General Patton saying that he would not be able to invade Sicily because he had gay soldiers in his command.   

When Carl Lombardo contemplated opening his first gelato shop at 734 E. Broadway Road, Mesa, everyone told him to stay away.

People often confide in their barbers, but Giuseppe Lazzara, owner of Papa Joe's Video Cuts Barber Shop in Chandler, has resolved to be more than just a receptive ear.

ROME - Rome declared a state of emergency as the swollen Tiber river threatened to flood Friday and the death toll from the heavy rains battering much of Italy rose to four.

CASAL DI PRINCIPE, Italy - The paratroopers' armored vehicles had barely taken up position in this fiefdom of the Casalesi crime clan when the mobsters decided to show who was boss.

Just outside the door of our store grows a dramatic artichoke plant. I watch and listen to visitors as they try to identify the plant — I’ve heard everything from rhubarb to milk thistle. Folks are flabbergasted when they find out it’s an artichoke.

LOS ANGELES - Frankie Laine, the big-voiced singer whose string of hits made him one of the most popular entertainers of the 1950s, died Tuesday. He was 93.

ROME - Bird flu has reached Western Europe, with Italy and Greece announcing Saturday they had detected the H5N1 strain of the virus in dead swans.

ROME - Italy's culture minister said Tuesday that New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art agreed to consider returning antiquities allegedly looted from Italy if it can be proven that the works were stolen.

Jan Dominguez of Mesa always tells people it was destiny for her to open a flag store. "I am a Navy veteran. My firstborn child was born on the Fourth of July. And my three children were born in the right order for their birthstones to be red, white and blue," said Dominguez, who opened Air A Zona Flag Co. about 14 years ago in Mesa with her sister, Diane Dilbeck.

September 2, 2004

At the new Angelo’s Hair Studio for Men at the Scottsdale Fiesta Plaza, you get your neck shaved with a straight razor — without asking — as part of a regular haircut.

Clarence "Bud" Thompson knows he may not survive the heart surgery he is to undergo this week.

Next year, we suppose, there will be a great to-do about the 60th anniversary of D-Day.

Want to learn about wine? I mean, really learn about wine? Sign up for International Sommelier Guild classes at the Phoenix Art Institute. Classes on wine fundamentals begin May 27 and meet Tuesdays for 12 weeks. The sommelier diploma class is coming in the fall. Fee is $1,500 for the 12-week course, and the sommelier class will be $3,100.