Health care for all Americans is the most pressing domestic issue today. It's far past time for the President and Congress to deliver health care to everyone.

I can understand why some people might look at me and say 'What's she got to be depressed about?' I get that a lot in Britain where mental health issues seem to be a big taboo.

Citizens must pressure the American Hospital Association the American Public Health Association the Centers for Disease Control and other relevant governmental agencies to make greening our hospitals and medical centers a top priority so that they themselves don't create even more illness.

The most common objection that I hear to walking as exercise is that it's too easy that only sweaty strenuous activity offers real benefits. But there is abundant evidence that regular brisk walking is associated with better health including lower blood pressure better moods and improved cholesterol ratios.

The World Health Organization has recognized acupuncture as effective in treating mild to moderate depression.

Productive achievement is a consequence and an expression of health and self-esteem not its cause.

My biography of Frank Sinatra is not paean to his music but rather an illumination of the man behind the music who once described himself as 'an 18-karat manic-depressive who lived a life of violent emotional contradictions with an over-acute capacity for sadness as well as happiness.'

But if you believe in Christ and that your main goal with your life is supposed to be to honor Him and do His will then you don't have as much pressure as someone who bases all their happiness on whether they're a movie star.

Friends have suggested that I am the least qualified person to talk about happiness because I am often down and sometimes profoundly depressed. But I think that's where my qualification comes from. Because to know happiness it helps to know unhappiness.

I had to try and find a way to express happiness without sounding corny.