Here's a question that tortures editors: When, if ever, is it appropriate to publish the name of the victim of a sex crime? And another: What if the "victim" turns out not to be a victim at all?

Forever, it seems, the media has not published the names of victims, confirmed or alleged, arguing that to do so would stigmatize the person and inhibit others from coming forward with their own accounts of abuse. Some advocates of women's rights think that should change.

To those of you asleep or just about to awaken in far corners of the globe, here's some news you missed:

Don Imus has been fired by CBS. It happened Thursday afternoon in New York, when Les Moonves, network president, lowered the boom. He had spoken with people all over the country, he said, of all ages and genders -- all presumably wanting the famous talk show host to go for the description he uttered last week about the Rutgers University women's basketball team: "nappy-headed hos."

This posting is not about Stars and Stripes, or newspapers in general, or the military. It is about the uses of the media -- with the implied subject of free speech and if sometimes it can be too free.

An ombudsman is a fancy name for a reader's representative at a newspaper. A big part of my job is to make sure your voice is heard -- whether it be raised to criticize, praise or just offer a suggestion to the editors of Stars and Stripes. And I aim to make sure your questions are answered. Check this space regularly for columns that have appeared in the paper and other musings of mine. I hope you'll tell me what you think of this newspaper and media in general. This "corner" is all yours.

A provocative letter from a U.S. officer serving in the U.K. appeared recently in Stars and Stripes. He was upset with the number of headlines he’d seen about Pat Tillman. “Enough already,” Maj. Jeff Snyder wrote. “… [I]f this were me or any number of thousands of others, not a peep would be said on the big-media stage. Does our service and sacrifice mean less if we are lost? I think not.” Read the rest of the column

People either love or hate the pronouncements of conservative columnist Ann Coulter on TV, in speeches and in a syndicated column run by about 100 newspapers. One of those newspapers is Stars and Stripes, and that fact has enlivened the letters-to-the-editor pages. Read the rest of the column

How fair have the media been in covering the Iraq war? Are the nation’s premier newspapers and television networks hellbent on declaring this war lost, or have they acted like lapdogs of the administration? They have been accused of both. What’s more recent is discussion of Stars and Stripes’ role in all this, a discussion with the added dimension that Stripes is a newspaper of the Department of Defense — although one that is editorially independent. Read the rest of the column