“In Death, Jacko’s Flaws ‘Beat It,’” Ellis Henican Sunday Column, Newsday, June 28, 2009, p. 2
Never speak ill of the freshly dead.
So deeply embedded is that dictum, people attend funerals of relatives they hated and priests deliver eulogies for mobsters and hoods.
Well, watch as the dictum is tested now.
Michael Jackson was a talented but [...]

“The Curse of 2012,” Ellis Henican Column, am/New York, June 26, 2009

Mark Sanford got caught with an Argentine mistress.
Bobby Jindal opened his mouth.
John Ensign two-timed with a one-time staffer.
By this point, Sarah Palin’s personal calamties are almost too numerous to name.
It’s the Republican Curse of 2012. Who else dares to enter this race? Call it [...]

“Etiquette Enforcement,” Ellis Henican Blog, “The Huffington Post,” June 24, 2009
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority has officially decided we’re not polite enough.
They should know, right?
These are the people who have done so much to coarsen the local language with expressions like “The train will be moving shortly” (yeah, right!) and “I have no idea how to [...]

“Deception No Present on Father’s Day,” Ellis Henican Sunday Column, Newsday, June 21, 2009
It’s the Father’s Day mystery that may never be solved.
No, not what happened to Steven Damman, the toddler whose disappearance from East Meadow in 1955 spurred a massive national child hunt. With luck, persistence and a few long memories, the real answer [...]

“140-Character World Changers,” Ellis Henican Column, am/New York, June 19, 2009, page 4
Why should Iranian election protesters have all the Twitter fun? Can’t other world events be hijacked, one 140-character outburst at a time?
Sure, they can. And soon they will be. Every day, it gets a little bit harder to tell the
social-networking Twittersphere from so-called [...]

“Albany Judgement Day,” Ellis Henican Sunday Column, Newsday, June 14, 2009

The court came to order.
After days of Albany pandemonium, the matter had finally arrived where it was headed all along, in the lap of a state court.
The issue? Effective control of the New York State Senate. The judge? The honorable Thomas McNamara, presiding alone.
Called into [...]