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The 10th Mountain Division was sent to Iraq 10 months ago. Its AO, area of operations, is about the size of Rhode Island, and more than five years into the war, its soldiers and officers are learning to fight what they call a "non-lethal" war, as well as the one in which people get killed. The non-lethal war was called "Winning Hearts and Minds" (with the unfortunate acronym WHAM) during the Vietnam War. In Iraq today, it's soldiers making sure a sewer line gets fixed, a TV station gets a 15-inch cable, that Iraqi trainee soldiers have uniforms.

Since the appearance of Saturday's story on the tragic death of Federal Corrections Officer Jose Rivera at United States Penitentiary Atwater, there's been no shortage of the name calling and verbal attacks to my voice mail and e-mail.

All of it is by people who have never met me personally. A small minority have even gone as far as threatening me with physical violence.

The anger and resentment came as a result of the article titled "Penitentiary Guard Killed," which appeared in the Sun-Star the day after 22-year-old Rivera was apparently brutally killed at the hands of two inmates at the prison. Many readers had disagreements with several elements of that article, which I will try to address here.

Everyone deserves at least 15 minutes of fame in their short lives here on earth.

As a journalist, I’ve had my name printed on the front page of several different newspapers several hundred times. So, although I’m not a national celebrity, I feel like I’ve had as much fame as I deserve.

Another local probably felt his 15 minutes were up about 35 years ago. But, Ruben Patron -- the Merced County Office of Education’s migrant education assistant superintendent -- is famous again after the Los Angeles Times ran a column about him on Monday.

I just finished Daniel Weintraub's book "Party of One," which is a look at Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's two terms leading the state.

The book, just above 200 pages, recaps the recall of Gov. Gray Davis, which was the perfect storm that let Arnold in the door, and then breaks down the tumultuous time he's spent in office.