The Beautiful Game: The international soccer body FIFA has banned its president Sepp Blatter and senior official Michel Platini for eight years. Blatter has been president of FIFA for 17 years and Platini is the man who was expected to …

Debatable: What if they held a Democratic presidential candidate debate on the Saturday night before Christmas? Would it make a noise? If it did, would anybody hear it? The debate opened with Bernie Sanders having to apologize for his staff …

Permawar: With hopes for peace after years of civil war, The United Nations Security Council agreed on a plan yesterday to end the slaughter in Syria and trade the regime of President Bashar al Assad for an elected government. Secy. …

Uncas Thinking: A ground war in Iraq would lead to 100 US deaths and 500 wounded every month, President Obama told a private meeting of news columnists earlier this week. He said the cost in lives and money was the …

Police Beat: The judge in the trial of a Baltimore police officer accused in the death of Freddie Gray declared a mistrial yesterday after the jury said it was unable to reach a unanimous verdict. Off. William Porter, 26, was charged …

Debatable: The Republican presidential candidates beat up each other last night over terrorism, immigration, and Donald Trump’s call to ban all foreign Muslims from entering the country. Rand Paul: “I think if we ban certain religions, if we censor the …

Selling It: Facing criticism that he’s not tough enough on terrorism and the Islamic State, President Obama said yesterday that the US is dropping more bombs than ever on ISIS. Since the terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., …

Poll-itics: In a flip-flop from the national trend, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz leads Donald Trump 24 percent to 19 percent in the Iowa Republican polls. Marco Rubio is running third at 17 percent. Chris Cillizza writes in The Washington Post …

Political Climate: World leaders celebrated yesterday after the release of an agreement that commits nearly every country on earth to lowering carbon emissions. One of the primary goals is — sometime between 2050 and 2100 — to limit the amount …

Political Climate: Delegates to the world climate change summit in Paris were expected to release the draft of an agreement that would commit nearly every country on earth to reducing the emission of greenhouse gases. The target is to keep …