Sam Fulwood III: Atticus Finch and Bill Cosby—fallen heroes?

  In what must be the greatest literary shocker of the past century, Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman—a companion to the widely read 1961 Pulitzer Prize winner To Kill a Mockingbird—went on sale Tuesday, detonating the sterling reputation of a much beloved and respected fictional hero.

  In Lee’s latest work, Atticus Finch—the stolid, strong-willed white lawyer who, in To Kill a Mockingbird, risked his social standing within a small-minded Alabama town in the 1930s by defending an innocent black man wrongly accused of raping a white woman—is shown to have become an anti-black racist.

Sam Fulwood III: America’s dearth of open-mindedness

  As I watch the yapping in the media and online—all these contentious mouths that pass off their opinions as real news—an important question keeps popping up: Is there any issue on which Americans collectively agree or withhold judgment with fair-minded neutrality?

  I can’t seem to find one.

Gene Policinski: Free Speech can be shield or sword, as Cosby furor shows

  Bill Cosby’s career has been deeply rooted in the possibilities and protections provided by freedom of speech.

  The legendary comedian and actor’s career began with landmark comedy routines in which he tackled sensitive racial subjects. He was the first African American male with a starring role on TV, in the 1960s series “I Spy.”