By MARTIN SCHRAM, Scripps Howard News Service
Schram: Swine flu could be Obama's Katrina
This week, as America marked the fourth anniversary of the natural disaster that devastated the city of New Orleans and the unresponsive presidency of George W. Bush, Washington's new team barely had time to notice.
Schram: Obama takes baby steps on veterans rights
The problem that President Obama was about to address was unconscionably big and growing worse: The huge backlog of Veterans' Affairs benefits claims filed by men and women who once fought America's battles -- only to discover they now must battle their own government, just to get what they already earned.
Schram: Cable News needs to become Truth Squad
Suddenly, the hate that once blazed here in Hate City spread like wildfire -- even faster.
Schram: Golden Rules for Great Communicators
This is not a time to borrow-and-bend the title made legendary by one of my earliest fellow travelers and occasional mentors, Teddy White -- because it is way too early to start talking about "The Unmaking of the President."
Schram: Bar shots of truth serum on healthcare
Here in Hate City, where the Potomac flows silently past an ever-babbling riverbank, the healthcare reform debate has degenerated into partisan sound-bite salvos. So far, all that is certain is that money is scarce and truth is scarcer.
Schram: CNN falls for GOP chart trap
Political propaganda fills our TV news screens -- it is Grand Old Party eye candy that is as colorful as a Hawaiian shirt that has been improved with lots of splashes of catsup and mustard.
Schram: Repression a common theme in Beijing, Tehran
The trouble with outsiders such as the international news media is that they love to cause trouble.
Such as telling the truth to the whole world. Or worse yet, letting the world see for itself those unfettered, unsightly truths.
Schram: Obama proves Middle East politics are local
Today, we begin with America's president and then channel a deceased icon of America's blue-collar politics to carry us to our destination -- the fates of Hezbollah in Lebanon and the hateful Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran.
Schram: Nunn-Lugar plan pays WMD dividends
For the best of us and the rest of us, life is about obstacles and how we face them. We can overcome them or be undone by them. But it does no good to pretend they don't exist and hope they'll just go away.
Schram: Left-Right Quick Quiz
It's hard to remember way back to the days when we didn't know our left from our right.
But because it feels great to ace any test, we begin today with a feel-good Left-Right Quickie Quiz:

