Editorials
Good Cabinet-making
Practicing what he preaches, President-elect Bush is taking the right steps in appointing Cabinet members who will serve their positions, not be political warm bodies.

Letters
Drug cost differences are remarkable
My wife and I are Canadian snowbirds who have been coming to Pasco County for the past 10 years since my retirement. We do appreciate the climate, the beauty and the people of Florida who make us feel welcome. Another plus is the St. Petersburg Times. It is the best newspaper we have ever subscribed to, for many reasons.

Robyn Blumner
You can't believe your eyes when the innocent are jailed
There's a classic joke in which a man who is caught in the act of cheating on his wife defends himself by saying: "Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?"

Bill Maxwell
A new life for the holidays
If we do not have a regular beat, most journalists are hit-and-run agents. We write about people and issues and rarely return to them.

Martin Dyckman
Trouble ahead for legislators in a Republican paradise
TALLAHASSEE -- The numbers are confusing as to which Florida went to the polls. The statewide vote split almost precisely down the middle, giving George W. Bush and Al Gore each 49 percent and electing a moderate Democrat to the U.S. Senate with 52 percent of the votes over a conservative Republican.

Books
Soul-searching journey through China
In 1983, two things happened to dissident Chinese writer Gao Xingjian that forever changed his life. A routine visit to his doctor revealed he had terminal lung cancer. Then, following a second X-ray two weeks later, Gao's doctors told him the tumor had mysteriously and miraculously disappeared.

Ex Libris Florida
GETTING BENCHED: Thomas E. Brennan, former chief justice of the Michigan Supreme Court and founding dean and president of the Thomas M. Cooley Law School in Lansing, Mich., knows about the bench.

Comic book escapades
In two lively novels and two tight collections of short stories, Michael Chabon has established himself as a writer of rare wit, eloquent prose and uncanny charm.