This post was written with Karen Pittman, CEO of the Forum for Youth Investment, and appeared at www.youthtoday.org.

It's so depressing: Last week brought yet another outrageous tale of zero tolerance gone wild -- this time from Maryland, where a high school suspended a lacrosse...

CNN, March 25: "Most Americans who live within 50 miles of a nuclear power plant aren't prepared for a nuclear emergency and don't think the police, hospitals and other emergency services in their community are prepared either, according to a new national poll."

That's just typical: Every time a disaster...

As the Tucson massacre fades from the top of the news and official Washington returns to debating volatile issues like health care, it's time to ask our national leaders this demanding question: Can you behave like 9-year-olds expect you to?

That was the challenge President Obama presented to America's elected...

Should the Pope quit? Should the Boy Scouts say sorry?

Those are among the questions that people have been asking as the Roman Catholic Church and the Boy Scouts of America get pummeled over sex abuse scandals. I understand the fury; now get over it.

I say this as a...

With depressing regularity, the men who run the Catholic Church do something that reminds me of why I'm part of the fastest growing religion in the country: Raised Catholic.

You know the type. Someone asks us what our religion is, and we act like you've stumped us on a game...

In the beginning, being seen as omnipotent in the eyes of my children was as easy as replacing the batteries in a toy dog that had stopped barking. As the kids grew, our home offered countless opportunities for me to demonstrate my high-tech prowess: fixing the computers, downloading videos from...

Washington, D.C. - The stories about people who sneak into White House parties just keeping coming, and I'm getting annoyed. Why doesn't everyone leave us alone?

I mean them. Leave them alone.

Ok, yes - I snuck into a White House party a few years ago. I shook hands with...

Jaycee Dugard's kidnapping story got me thinking about the day I got a call from a distraught child molester.

I had gotten to know Carl well when he was in a Virginia prison, as I based a book about sex abuse on his life as a pedophile. After Carl...

On day three of our week-long fathers-and-sons trip from our homes in Maryland to a wrestling camp in Vermont, the boys finally get what they've been demanding for a year: Friendly's ice cream.

"We're going to Friendly's every day!" our wrestling coach's son had promised his teammates on the same...

Like most parents, over the years I have gradually abandoned my youthful vices for the comfort of family life, to the point where the only indulgences I have left are pathetic. One of them is speeding.

I'm not even talking about fun speeding -- the kind that makes other...