A week ago, this columnist wrote skeptically about strike threats by the teachers' union, leading the union's president, Randi Weingarten, to accuse him of sexism.

At the same time, Barasch wrote skeptically of what he called "new-age Calvinism" and of what he viewed as the woolly-mindedness of some of his cohorts.

The Chosun Ilbo, another conservative newspaper, wrote skeptically in an editorial of Mr. Roh's new goal of attracting enough investment to double national incomes in five years.

Both magazines write skeptically about the "Torah codes" phenomenon, which claims that the Bible contains encrypted messages prophesying events.

A participant in the Columbia University protests of the late 1960's, he later wrote skeptically about leftist governments in Latin America.

On ecological issues, Charen often writes skeptically about environmentalists, who, she argues, often "may not know what they're talking about".

In later years, "a subtle escalation was introduced," Dr. Jeremy Bernstein in "Hitler's Uranium Club" (AIP Press, 1996) , wrote skeptically.

THERE have always been articulate critics of technology in the United States, like Lewis Mumford, the social philosopher who wrote skeptically of the "myth of the machine."

He often wrote skeptically about the Clinton administration's approach to Pyongyang, but says that engagement has borne fruit.

For example, James writes skeptically of British efforts to suppress the slave trade by using William Wilberforce as a figurehead.