In the past 24 hours, I have read three compelling and thought-provoking pieces from three of my favorite columnists/thinkers: Thomas Friedman, George Will and Fareed Zakaria. You can read them in five minutes each.

Friedman wrote an excellent piece on energy policy, fairly brimming with common sense, in this morning's NYT.

And in this week's Newsweek, Will had some very thoughtful questions for Obama. One thing I appreciate about Will is that none of the questions were about "noise" like flag pins, Rev. Wright, bowling, or Obama's religion (Can you believe that a recent poll showed that 13% of us think that Obama is a Muslim? Absurd.) Will's questions were essentially about serious policy issues and were generally fair. Despite these very good questions from Will, I am still leaning towards Obama...but these questions are further reminders that Obama will not be a panacea for our nation's problems. Will promised questions for McCain next time.

Finally, Zakaria wrote a compelling piece about McCain's foreign policy, focusing on a recent speech that McCain made in Los Angeles...which I think the Anonymous Hawk and Mrs. Hawk attended. Although you might be able to take issue with certain of Zakaria's word choices, it is crucial to have serious discussions on these looming policy issues. Whether you agree with Zakaria's points on McCain's foreign policy or not (and I generally do), you should appreciate a thoughtful piece that is focused on real issues and doesn't get into "noise" topics like McCain's "preacher problem." Some people still are wasting a lot of ink and TV time on those silly topics...oops! I resemble that remark! (My pastor entry on this thread a few days ago.)