Conjuring more toil and trouble

Christine O'Donnell gazed earnestly into the camera for a campaign ad this month and proclaimed: "I'm not a witch."

It may have been a first in American politics, at least since the late 1600s, but the Delaware Republican was engaging in damage control to protect her quest for a seat in the United States Senate. The brouhaha stemmed from a video clip from 1999 in which she admitted to having "dabbled into witchcraft." And her qualification that "I never joined a coven" was taken about as seriously as Bill Clinton's claim that he "didn't inhale."

But while spells, magic potions and pagan rituals may be rare in the halls of power, they still hold sway with many people around the world. Symbols of the occult are easy to find, especially these days, with Halloween looming at the end of the month, and the Mexican celebration of the Day of the Dead just after.