What motivated US Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan to open fire on his fellow soldiers at Fort Hood’s Soldier Readiness Center on November 5, 2009? Is he a “terrorist”--mounting evidence suggests Hasan’s actions were premeditated and ideologically motivated--or is he just an Army medical officer who snapped under pressure? That’s the central issue investigators and military courts must ultimately determine.

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This Veterans Day, the victims and heroes of the shooting at Fort Hood, Texas on November 5 will be much on the minds of those who take time to think about and honor American veterans. We understand and appreciate the risks they take in combat zones, but we don't expect them to come under attack on a secure military base in the United States. We certainly don't expect the attack to come from one of their own.

If there is anything positive to reflect on in this tragedy, its the way our military personnel and their civilian counterparts reacted to it. Despite the large number of casualties at Fort Hood, it appears that the number could have been much higher. Major Nidal Malik Hasan is reported to have fired more than 100 rounds from his semi automatic pistol into a crowd of 500 soldiers. The quick reactions of Department of the Army police officer Kim Munley and her partner Sgt. Mark Todd and their close-range gun battle with Hasan prevented him for killing and wounding more than he did. Speaking of Munley, LTG Robert Cone, the senior commanding general at Fort Hood, said "It was an amazing and an aggressive performance by this police officer."

Munley and Todd weren't the only heroes. LTG Cone cited numerous other acts of heroism by soldiers who used their combat life-saving skills on wounded soldiers until the first ambulances arrived. Other soldiers responded instinctively, leading their buddies out of the danger zone.

We've come to expect this kind of behavior from our brave men and women in uniform, but we should never take it for granted. Since 9/11 we seen all too often the great sacrifices our military veterans and civilian first responders so often are called upon to make. As they in the past and will in the future, at Fort Hood the worked side by side to stop the killing and save lives.

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Do you ever get the feeling, watching the news out of Washington, DC, that you’ve been transported to the Twilight Zone?

For an off-year election the races of 2009 have stirred up a hornet's nest. Of special interest are the gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey and the special election in the 23rd District of New York. I addressed all three in last week’s column.

As usual, the winners, most likely the Republicans in at least two out of the three, will interpret the results in broad national terms. The losers will remind us that all politics is local. Both are correct. The trick for both parties is interpreting their relative significance and applying lessons learned to the races to come in 2010.

More immediately, what message will Tuesday's election results send to senators and representatives in Congress who will vote on healthcare-reform legislation? Republicans hope that victories in Virginia, New Jersey, and New York will send a powerful message to "vulnerable" House Democrats who all must face reelection in 2010. Why else were Democrats in such a hurry to pass reform legislation?

Tuesday's election results may sway some votes in the House, but it would be folly for Republicans and Americans opposed to current healthcare-reform legislation to invest too much hope here. Nancy Pelosi's leverage with House Democrats is considerable. I suspect the current bill before the house will pass. When that happens, the ball will be in the Senate's court where the dreaded "public option" has less support but likely will make to a floor vote.

Odds are that an amendment will remove the public option from the Senate bill. What emerges from the conference committee won't be everything Democrats wanted, but it may still be sweeping, radical reform. Herein is the key to 2010 and 2012. If Democrats force through healthcare-reform legislation that the majority of Americans abhor, they may have signed their own pink slips.

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In a recent Washington Post poll, only 21 percent of Americans identified themselves as Republicans. Overwhelming Democrat majorities in Congress marginalize Republicans in government. Still, Democrats continue to run against the last Republican administration as they attempt to rush transformational legislation through Congress, worrying about Republican gains in the 2010 election.

At the same time, President Barack Obama has declared all-out war on Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, the US Chamber of Commerce, and the health insurance industry.

Democrats in and out of government attack and ridicule the "tea-party" movement as the left-wing blogosphere and entertainment communities attack conservative Sarah Palin as if she already were running against Barack Obama in the 2012 election.

Conservatives, however, spend almost as much time criticizing Republicans as they do Democrats. In the race for the vacant seat in the 23rd District of New York, national Republican politicians are supporting the Conservative Party candidate over the Republican.

What's going on here, and who is really running against whom?

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I've decided to come clean this week and reveal my enemies list. Like the White House, I will continue to deal with the people on my list, but I won't allow their evil deeds to get in the way of my providing honest information the the American people.

1. People who design automated telephone answering systems for businesses, especially those who make it impossible to ever speak with a human being.

2. City governments who use speed cameras, especially those in 15 mph zones.

3. Companies that only manufacture men's clothing in even numbered sizes.

4. Stores that only have shopping carts with three functioning wheels.

5. Movie theaters that believe freezing temperatures and 100 db sound systems enhance the movie-going experience.

6. Minivan drivers that have to pass you so they can slow down and block your view of the road ahead.

7. Cable news stations that believe Americans still want 24/7 news coverage of the "balloon boy" story after everyone knows it was a hoax.

8. Cable news networks that run 'BREAKING NEWS' banners under stories they have been reporting for the past 8 yours.

9. The dozens of white-tailed deer that believe my back yard is Motel 6 and my shrubs are the free morning buffet.

10. Consumer electronics manufacturers that introduce new, more capable products faster than I can afford to buy them.

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We hear conflicting reports about troop morale in the US armed forces. High-profile people who visit our troops in Afghanistan, Iraq, and other places report that morale is high. After eight years of war since 9/11, however, years more of war ahead, and the US strategy to win it uncertain, others report that troop morale is low. Whatever the situation, now, more than ever, it’s important that American leaders and the American people not take troop morale for granted and exercise great care not to squander this most precious commodity essential to success.

There's nothing like 3 hours one-on-one in the back of a cargo plane in the middle of a Vietnam monsoon with Jonathan Winters to pump up a soldiers morale.

In the spring of 1967 comedian Jonathan Winters headlined a USO tour to South Vietnam. One of his stops was to the 2nd Brigade of the 9th Infantry Division's base camp at Dong Tam in the Mekong Delta. Winters put on a hilarious evening show for the troops, of which I was one. He had everyone in stitches. Mid-morning the next day a US Army Caribou cargo plane was parked on the tarmac next to my small observation H-23 helicopter. Winters and his fellow entertainers were onboard awaiting takeoff to his next destination. As I was walking to my doorless helo the clouds burst and a torrent of rain began to fall. Sitting under the Plexiglas bubble of the H-23 provided little cover. I was soaked to the bone.

I heard a voice call out, and I looked toward the Caribou where I saw Winters waiving to me to get in out of the rain. Once inside, Winters guided me forward in the aircraft to a place away from the others. For the next three hours, wind and rain buffeted the Caribou as if it were flying through it. Winters alternately talked with me and entertained me in his typical style. I laughed and cried as he told me stories about his own service in World War II. "I was a Marine on the only US aircraft carrier not hit by a kamikaze." he told me, using hand gestures and accents to make his point. Other than that, not once during the three hours did he repeat any of the jokes and stories he had told the night before.

When the rain stopped and the tower gave permission for waiting aircraft to take off, I thanked him, we shook hands, and I returned to my aircraft and the war with a much appreciated diversion from it. The contribution Winters, Bob Hope, and many others made to troop morale in Vietnam is beyond measure.

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What can I say about the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s award of the Nobel Peace Prize to President Barack Obama? Statements of shock and surprise have poured in from around the world. Even Obama’s fellow travelers were surprised. The president himself could hardly believe it. Perhaps we might pause, however, before we scratch our heads and move on, and consider the “teachable moment” here. Why are so many people saying this is all about George W. Bush; and what does this tell us about America’s European critics and how we should consider what they say and do?

Judging from the way elementary and high school history books treat Christopher Columbus these days, he was a pretty bad guy. Watching the formerly-mainstream media you'd get the idea that for every Columbus Day parade there's a demonstration protesting the holiday.

We have to wonder how much longer we'll have a national holiday named after Columbus before Congress passes a bill changing it. Now that he's won the Nobel Peace Prize, I'm sure there are plenty of Democrats who would like to make it Barack Obama day. With their majorities in Congress they could pass such a bill without a single Republican vote. Of course, the president is too smart to sign it, so we'll either have to stick with Columbus or find someone else.

Columbus wasn't the first European to discover America anyway. Leif Ericson is widely regarded as the first European to have landed in North America 492 years before Columbus. But we already have a Leif Ericson Day, and I don't think we want to name a national holiday after a Norwegian? It might give the Norwegian Nobel Committee the wrong idea. Then there's the claim that Henry Sinclair of the Knights Templar came to America in the 1300s. Given that many of his fellow knights were burned at the stake as heretics, you know what textbook writers would do with that. How about the ice-age Europeans that some believe crossed the Atlantic along the ice shelf between Europe and North America? Unfortunately GEICO already has the rights to their image locked up tight. Oh well, I guess we'll have to stick with poor old Columbus for the time being.

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