Mushroom cloud: U.S. intelligence officials tell us there is no evidence indicating North Korea conducted a nuclear test earlier this month. Gay debate: Based on his past comments, it seems certain that Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry will move to lift the military's ban on open homosexuals, if he becomes commander in chief. Beslan lessons: A special-operations source has provided us with a quick appraisal of what went wrong, militarywise, in the Beslan, Russia, school hostage bloodbath. For one, Russian's premiere counterterrorism unit, Alfa, did not arrive on the scene until less than a hour before an explosion touched...