James M. Kelly, the powerful city councilor from South Boston who was considered a pugnacious neighborhood champion by his supporters but a polarizing symbol of intolerance by others, died yesterday morning after a long battle with cancer. He was 66.

After one particularly serious bout of depression, humorist Art Buchwald once joked that he had decided against committing suicide because he was afraid The New York Times wouldn't find his death sufficiently newsworthy for a story.

Approximately one dozen war protesters, many holding signs, gathered at the busy Five Corners intersection in Vineyard Haven late Thursday, one day after President George W. Bush announced plans to increase U.S. combat troop levels in Iraq in an effort to quell sectarian violence.

The departed Consider, for a moment, two of the many compliments paid to South Boston political icon Jimmy Kelly following his death from cancer Tuesday morning.

No one could say quite how he did it, but Art Buchwald, Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper columnist, prolific author and veteran political satirist, somehow wangled himself an extra helping of his rich life.

I didn't know Charlotte Ericson, but after reading her obituary, I'm sure I would have liked her. I would have liked Virginia Larson, too. And John Sala.

SUDBURY -- An overflow crowd of somber residents came to Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School last night, seeking to understand how the school's seeming safety was shattered when a 15-year-old freshman was stabbed to death last week and a special needs student was charged in the killing.