URBANDALE, Iowa — On the evening of the Iowa caucuses , Joe Burns, a 71-year-old convenience store manager here, came to Walnut Hills Elementary School in sharply contested Dallas County with the intention of making up his mind. Burns and his wife, Mary, who are among Iowa’s vast ranks of undecided voters, followed a line past lost-and-found boxes filled with mittens and scarves and a mural that read “It’s About Respect, Respect Iowa.” In the school’s cafeteria, the county recorder, wearing a blue Mitt Romney sweater, registered voters and handed Burns a slip of paper with the names of the competing candidates. The Burnses sat at one of the miniature children’s tables and mulled who they wanted to be the next president of the United States. Read full article > >

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Iowans gather in community centers, churches, schools to vote

The Giants snapped a four-game losing streak in the most dramatic of fashions, battling back against the Dallas Cowboys after trailing by 12 with just under six minutes remaining.

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Giants 37, Cowboys 34: Giants Ice Cowboys and Their Skid

On the eve of baseball’s winter meetings in Dallas, the Miami Marlins and Reyes agreed to a six-year contract worth $106 million, according to a person with direct knowledge of the agreement.

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Reyes, a Longtime Met, Is Set to Leave for the Marlins

On the morning of Friday, Nov. 18, as most of the Washington Redskins gathered for special teams meetings, offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan called quarterback Rex Grossman into his office. On a flat-screen television, Shanahan ran tape of what seemed to be an innocuous play from nearly two months earlier — a third-down pass on a Monday night in Dallas, when Grossman had looked for wide receiver Terrence Austin. The play was designed to go for a touchdown, but Austin tripped, and the ball fell incomplete. Read full article > >

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In the NFL, one play can alter a season

With Brian Orakpo charging from the right side and Ryan Kerrigan on the left, the Washington Redskins figured they had the edges shored up. Any opposing quarterback would be bracketed by Washington’s pair of young, hungry pass-rushers — a dangerous if slightly predictable blueprint. “You see it all the time around the league, guys moving around, giving teams different looks,” Orakpo said. “You see it with Dallas and Baltimore — all the good pass rushers are all over the place. With us, we’ve been a bit more stagnant, rushing the same guys all the time.” Read full article > >

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Brian Orakpo, Ryan Kerrigan help Redskins defense increase sack totals

Last Thanksgiving Day, when 31.9 million people watched the New Orleans Saints play the Dallas Cowboys, 10.75 million of them were women. Overall, 44 percent of the National Football League’s fans are women. If you follow the sport, this is no revelation. The football widow is an anachronism; girls and women populate stadiums and sports bars, and have for years. In a recent Washington Post survey of D.C. sports fans , 53 percent of this area’s women said they care about the NFL, and 25 percent said they care “a great deal.” Read full article > >

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Flag football: It’s the girls’ turn to play

Last Thanksgiving Day, when 31.9 million people watched the New Orleans Saints play the Dallas Cowboys, 10.75 million of them were women. Overall, 44 percent of the National Football League’s fans are women. If you follow the sport, this is no revelation. The football widow is an anachronism; girls and women populate stadiums and sports bars, and have for years. In a recent Washington Post survey of D.C. sports fans , 53 percent of this area’s women said they care about the NFL, and 25 percent said they care “a great deal.” Read full article > >

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Flag football: It’s the girls’ turn to play

The Washington Capitals hadn’t been on the ice for more than a few minutes Wednesday at the team’s practice facility in Arlington before they were told to line up on both goal lines for suicide sprints. They expected this, players said afterward, that the uninspired effort in a 5-2 loss to the Dallas Stars and in other recent outings warranted it. Read full article > >

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Coach Bruce Boudreau puts Capitals through grueling workout after shabby effort

First, the (possibly) bad news: If you’re expecting Stephen King to provide an alternative history of what America would have been like had John F. Kennedy not been assassinated in Dallas, put those expectations aside. Not until 800 pages have gone by in “ 11/22/63 ” does King offer up an account of the world as it might have been, and even then it has a cursory, I’m-doing-this-because-I have-to feel to it. This does not belong on the What If? shelf that has given us the Nazis-win works of Robert Harris (“ Fatherland ”) and Philip K. Dick (“ The Man in the High Castle ”), or the Charles Lindbergh presidency of Philip Roth (“ The Plot Against America ”). Read full article > >

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Stephen King’s “11/22/63”

There is a noticeably more aggressive, confrontational President Obama roaming the country these days, selling his jobs plan and attacking Republicans for standing in the way of progress by standing up only for the rich. In Texas on Tuesday, the president went after a leading Republican by name: “Yesterday the Republican majority leader in Congress, Eric Cantor, said that right now he won’t even let this jobs bill have a vote in the House of Representatives,” Obama said. “I would like Mr. Cantor to come here to Dallas and explain what exactly in this jobs bill does he not believe in, what exactly he is opposed to. Does he not believe in rebuilding America’s roads and bridges? Does he not believe in tax breaks for small businesses or efforts to help our veterans?” Read full article > >

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President Obama goes on the attack, to Democrats’ delight

Arch West, the inventor of the Dorito, died last week in Dallas. His daughter said that the family planned to sprinkle his urn with the flavored tortilla chips before burying it in dirt. “He’ll love it,” she told the Dallas Morning News. His 97-year life introduced and shaped the Age of the Snack. There was, after all, a time when sustenance was not neon. When mealtime was a specific time, rather than a movable feast of incessant grazing carried out by a nation of noshers and their Grab-n-Go Snak Packs ( 100 Calories! I’ll have six ). Read full article > >

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Munch ado about Doritos, one man’s iconic snack

Larry Hagman sold off memorabilia and estate items, netting the Dallas star $500,000 at a Beverly Hills auction. The actor even showed up to encourage buyers to “bid high and bid often.” The top-selling item was the sterling parade saddle Hagman rode…

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Larry Hagman Sells Dallas Memorabilia

Star athletes Shaquille O’Neal, Drew Brees, Dustin Pedroia and Kevin Ogletree all believe that a little wristband somehow gives them an extra boost. “I kept feeling something when I wore the bracelet. . . . I’ve been wearing the bracelet ever since,” basketball legend O’Neal says in an endorsment on the Web site of the company that makes the Power Balance bracelet, which features hologram stickers. Meanwhile, Kevin Ogletree of the Dallas Cowboys is one of 22 current and former professional athletes endorsing the Ampli5 wristband, with the special stainless-steel clasp. The company claims the piece of metal helps enhance a person’s natural “frequencies.” Read full article > >

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Unproven wristbands prove popular

Kevin Durant scored 39 points as Oklahoma City advanced to the Western Conference finals, where it will play Dallas starting Tuesday.

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Thunder 105, Grizzlies 90: Thunder Ruins Grizzlies’ Upset Hopes

A federal grand jury indicted a 20-year-old Saudi man for attempting to blow up a number of targets, including the Dallas home of former President George W. Bush. Khalid Aldawsari was charged with attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction, and if…

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Indictment in Foiled Bush Bomb Plot