In the spirit of the upcoming new season of The Price Is Right, hosted now by Drew Carey, Mo Rocca takes to the streets to see how well New Yorkers know their prices...

After roughly two years, the U.S. and India have completed an agreement which allows each nation to participate in each other's civilian nuclear energy sector. And now more than ever, I'm convinced that we just don't like Iran.

Think about it. Iran gets nuclear weapons, and the U.S. gets shaken up and an international hissy fit arises. India gets nukes, and we're signing them on as a normal trading partner after we failed to keep them from getting the bomb in the first place. Now India is still proliferating nuclear weapons, and we see nothing but dollar signs for us.

Supposedly the administration hopes to send the message to Iran that "if you behave responsibly in regards to nonproliferation...you will not be penalized but will be invited to participate more fully in international nuclear trade" (Nicholas Burns, U.S. Under Secretary of State). Behaving responsibly, eh? I guess responsible means not signing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

I suppose it's best that we're not going to war with India anyways. After all, who else can we call when our Dell stops working?

No doubt Faith Bible is known for clearly presenting the concept of total depravity. One can't regularly attend and not understand that humanity is intrinsically opposed to God. This usually leads to the idea that we are so evil and insignificant compared to God that He really has no need for saving anyone.

I have had some problems with this view, however. The Bible makes it clear that God is extremely jealous for His own glory (Ex. 34:14, Deut. 4:24, Nahum 1:2, Joshua. 24:19). God passionately desires glory, but we are unable to glorify God except through the Holy Spirit, which dwells in every believer. So is it possible that God indeed must save people? For otherwise, He will not receive the glory and worship which He so greatly requires. I could be wrong, but all the same I've begun to cringe whenever someone says that God doesn't need to save anyone. I'm not at all suggesting that we can have some kind of leverage over God, for that would oppose the order of creation. I'll just throw this one out there and see what happens.

And as a sort of vaguely related addendum, there is a distinct difference between being depraved and deprived. I've heard people confuse the two so many times, it makes me crazy beyond belief. Depravity is innate corruption due to original sin, whereas deprivation is the forceful withholding of something.

Finally, the last Harry Potter book is out. Let the mini-brained festivities commence.

I liked the first four or so books, but you can only just barely escape Voldemort a certain number of times before it gets ridiculous. You know Harry can't die before the last book, so the other 600 or so pages are just filler to keep you interested and to keep J.K. Rowling rich. It's no skin off my nose if Potter finally kicks it in the last book.

Of course, the worst part of it is the people who, despite being awfully thickheaded, hold themselves to be scholars for reading Rowling's invariably massive books. Never mind the fact that they barely scrape through English classes and couldn't spell their way out of a simple writing prompt; they can read entertaining books written to accommodate the semantic level of a third grader.

I'll no doubt be reading the 7th book soon, although there is definitely some doubt as to whether it's even worth reading. I mean, Rowling finished the last chapter back in 1999. She can't be that great of a writer if it took the editors this long to rewrite her book.

I have always contended that Starbucks, despite being a coffee shop, fails desperately at serving real coffee. Unless that syrupy goo they pump into your drink qualifies as coffee, we shouldn't call Starbucks a coffee shop.

Of course, I love the taste of Starbucks beverages, but I still prefer my own coffee at home. Recently I concocted my own iced coffee beverage, which I believe is comparable to Starbucks as far as taste goes. As far as price, I'd estimate that the ingredients themselves, in the amounts in which I use them, cost a total of 50 cents, if even that. Compare that to $3.25 for a caffe latte. (I'm over it. Really.)