Happy new fiscal year! Yep, it’s July 1 and the start of another glorious year in money for the state of Illinois.

Faster than you could say “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes,” restaurants and grocery stores began yanking Roma and red plum varieties off their tables and shelves amid a nationwide outbreak of salmonella.

The June 13 death of "Meet the Press" moderator Tim Russert was notable not only because of his fame: The 58-year-old's heart attack was startling and sudden. One minute he was recording voice-overs. The next he collapsed.

An incident of miscommunication involving U.S. Rep. Bill Foster, D-14th District, shows how even good intentions can have bad results. Foster agreed to attend a May 16 student assembly at Community High School in West Chicago, and the school believed this would be a newsworthy event. An invitation was sent May 12 via e-mail to Suburban Life Publications to send a reporter and photographer to cover the assembly.

If Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s administration wasn’t motivated to get its arms around the state’s chronic Medicaid payment backlog before, the pressure is really on now.

Not surprisingly, the leadership in Iraq has put off efforts by the United States to draft a security agreement intended to define the role of American troops in Iraq for the months and years to come.

Memorial Day is an annual reminder that calls to our attention the great debt of gratitude we owe all those who have served in the nation’s armed forces. They have served in every time of pain, confusion, doubt and outright attack in the nation’s history.

If Gov. Rod Blagojevich's administration wasn't motivated to get its arms around the state's chronic Medicaid payment backlog before -- despite chiding from the comptroller and from this page -- the pressure is really on now.

Americans have begun receiving their much-awaited stimulus checks from the federal government, though they may have spent them several times over in their heads while they waited.

If Illinois is serious about a mammoth plan for public construction and repair projects, it’s time we part with the notion that we can have something for nothing.

We'll cash those stimulus checks, but further action on the economy should be limited in cost and targeted toward families and sectors where a little additional stimulus will go a long way.

For most young people, a graduation is the first major turning point of their lives.

A tax holiday for drivers? A new way to bleed Big Oil? These may be music to motorists' ears. But short-term, neither will result in significant savings.

Recession? Contraction? Slowdown? Semantics matter little to pinched consumers.

Given the enormity of the problems this world faces from an environmental standpoint, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed.