Taking stock of people and ideas in the news.

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• The Next Majority Leader Half the man Trent Lott was.
  Chris Suellentrop Dec. 18, 2002
  
• Peter Jackson The splatter flicks lurking within his Lord of the Rings.
  Chris Suellentrop Dec. 11, 2002
  
• Mark Cuban How to meddle with your sports team—the right way.
  Chris Suellentrop Dec. 5, 2002
  
• Hans Blix Incompetent bureaucrat or cowardly diplomat?
  Chris Suellentrop Nov. 27, 2002
  
• Sandy Weill How Citigroup's CEO rewrote the rules so he could live richly.
  Chris Suellentrop Nov. 21, 2002
  
• Nancy Pelosi The leader the House Democrats deserve.
  Chris Suellentrop Nov. 13, 2002
  
• Harry Potter Pampered jock, patsy, fraud.
  Chris Suellentrop Nov. 8, 2002
  
• Doug Gansler Will the sniper trial be his big break?
  Chris Suellentrop Nov. 1, 2002
  
• Kim Jong-il North Korea's international man of mystery.
  Chris Suellentrop Oct. 25, 2002
  
• The Anaheim Angels The worst team you've never heard of.
  Chris Suellentrop Oct. 18, 2002
  
• Frank Lautenberg Scrappy, mean, and insecure: He truly represents New Jersey.
  Chris Suellentrop Oct. 11, 2002
  
• The Anti-War Democrats They're naive and clumsy. Is that so wrong?
  Chris Suellentrop Oct. 2, 2002
  
• Scott Ritter What turned the hawkish Iraq weapons inspector into a dove?
  Michael Crowley Sept. 25, 2002
  
• Tony Blair Bush's ambassador to America.
  Chris Suellentrop Sept. 13, 2002
  
• Rudy Giuliani He's blowing his chance to make a difference.
  Chris Suellentrop Sept. 6, 2002
  
• Missouri College Students Are they really that miserable?
  Chris Suellentrop Aug. 30, 2002
  
• Richard Perle Washington's faceful bureaucrat.
  Chris Suellentrop Aug. 23, 2002
  
• Lewis and Clark Stop celebrating. They don't matter.
  David Plotz Aug. 16, 2002
  
• The Rev. John McCloskey The Catholic Church's K Street lobbyist.
  Chris Suellentrop Aug. 9, 2002
  
• Nevada America's Yucca Mountain of vice.
  Chris Suellentrop July 19, 2002
  
• Donald Fehr The man behind baseball's unbreakable union.
  Chris Suellentrop July 12, 2002
  
• Harvey Pitt Why the accounting scandals aren't his fault.
  Chris Suellentrop July 5, 2002
  
• Amtrak The little engine that couldn't.
  Chris Suellentrop June 26, 2002
  
• John Ashcroft The man you hate to hate.
  Chris Suellentrop June 21, 2002
  
• The New Business Villains Four easy steps to the bottom.
  Chris Suellentrop June 14, 2002
  
• Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee Can he make peace with Pakistan?
  Chris Suellentrop June 10, 2002
  
• The Men Who Would Be McCain 
  Chris Suellentrop May 31, 2002
  
• The Phoenix FBI Agent Kenneth Williams, human Rorschach test.
  Chris Suellentrop May 24, 2002
  
• Jimmy Carter He would have gotten away with it if it weren't for those meddling voters.
  Chris Suellentrop May 17, 2002
  
• President Ulysses S. Grant He's not a Lost Cause anymore.
  Chris Suellentrop May 10, 2002
  
• Crown Prince Abdullah Saudi Arabia's prince of peace.
  Chris Suellentrop May 3, 2002
  
• The Ugly Europeans Jean-Marie Le Pen, Jörg Haider, and other xenophobes.
  Chris Suellentrop April 26, 2002
  
• Cynthia McKinney The rep who cries racism.
  Chris Suellentrop April 19, 2002
  
• Abdullah Azzam The godfather of jihad.
  Chris Suellentrop April 16, 2002
  
• Gen. Anthony Zinni Zelig goes to the Middle East.
  Chris Suellentrop April 5, 2002
  
• Mitch McConnell The First Amendment's reluctant defender.
  Chris Suellentrop March 29, 2002
  
• The Politician's Wife Behind every great woman is a dead husband.
  Chris Suellentrop March 22, 2002
  
• Bob Knight It's OK if you hate him. He hates himself, too.
  Chris Suellentrop March 15, 2002
  
• Thomas Friedman What makes the Timesman a great columnist? Not that peace proposal.
  David Plotz March 8, 2002
  
• The Clintonista Candidates Gov. Janet Reno? Sen. Erskine Bowles? Rep. Rahm Emanuel?
  David Plotz March 1, 2002
  
• Sean Combs Why is Puffy deflating?
  David Plotz Feb. 22, 2002
  
• Rep. Billy Tauzin The Potemkin populism of the Republicans' chief Enron investigator.
  David Plotz Feb. 15, 2002
  
• Muhammad Ali How the Greatest became an Islamic teddy bear.
  David Plotz Feb. 8, 2002
  
• U2 Their vague majesties of rock.
  David Plotz Jan. 25, 2002
  
• Former Sen. John Danforth Why is "St. Jack" helping Arthur Andersen?
  David Plotz Jan. 18, 2002
  
• The Plagiarist Why Stephen Ambrose is a vampire.
  David Plotz Jan. 11, 2002