On a night like no other when America’s open and democratic virtues were put on worldwide display, an ill-advised policy within the Department of Defense proclaimed to servicemembers and the news media alike: “No you can’t.” What a servicemember and a journalist couldn’t do, the policy drafters ordered, was engage in conversation on a military base as the returns from a momentous election rolled in.

Perhaps it was inevitable. In the worst days in Iraq, complaints multiplied about the media’s “negative” reporting of the war. There’s little of that now, as the situation improves there. Now, apparently, it’s the turn of Afghanistan, where the days may not be the worst they have been, but they are not good. In an interview given to The Associated Press on Oct. 26, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David McKiernan, blasted the media for pessimistic reports from that battleground, and he said he’s tired of it.

Stars and Stripes, in its print form, is not distributed in the United States. But an important part of its congressionally mandated mission is to keep its readers abroad up to date on what is happening back home. A large amount of its content comes from syndicated outlets whose writers are mostly serving up news and information to a domestic audience. Sending that content abroad lets Stripes’ customers read the same things their countrymen are reading back home.

The Defense Department is embarking on a far-reaching consolidation of its information units. Many entities, ranging from the American Forces Radio and Television Service, the DefenseLink Web site, the various service magazines, the Pentagon Channel -- and Stars and Stripes -- will now fall under a new organization called Defense Media Activity (DMA). (The unit already has been formed but for now lacks a director.)

Here’s a question that nettles newspaper editors: How far out do comments by a reader have to be to be considered unfit for general consumption? The answer, usually, is pretty far out.

The Sarah vs. Joe saga continues. After assessing the coverage Ms. Palin and her rival for the vice presidency, Joe Biden, have been getting in Stars and Stripes (see the latest column/blog below), I was confident the controversy wouldn't abate. I was right. A reader from Wiesbaden, Germany, took offense at -- what else? -- a  Doonesbury cartoon. In that Sept. 23 strip, author Garry Trudeau reduced Palin (literally) to a talking doll that "lies."

In a letter-to-the-editor from Baghdad, Lt. Col. Chuck Workman asked: "What's up with your news coverage of Sarah Palin?" The editors were accused of making "an effort to cut and paste left-leaning stories [about her] that have been proven inaccurate." No examples were given. Finally, the letter asked, "What about Joe Biden?" implying that he was getting a free ride.

In this job I’ve had to deal more frequently than I had imagined with questions about a part of a newspaper that you’d think would be the least controversial: cartoons. I received complaints about two strips that appeared in Stars and Stripes recently. One was an entry from "Doonesbury," an occasional lightning rod for reader comments. "Doonesbury" appears on one of Stripes’ opinion pages. The other strip in question was from "Meaning of Lila," which is on the comics pages. "Doonesbury" was found to be objectionable for allegedly intimating in Sept. 14 editions that some U.S. government officials, especially Vice President Dick Cheney, were "wanted" for war crimes. A "Lila" strip published Sept.