Sticky posts not acting as expected in query_posts()

This is in WP 2.8.5 — that version isn’t currently available in forum dropdown.

I’m trying to make a category template, showing all the posts in one category with paging to older/newer posts. I also want sticky posts to show up first.

I had thought this was how query_posts() would work by default. Here’s the code I’m using (adapted from the codex):

<?php
$paged = (get_query_var('paged')) ? get_query_var('paged') : 1;
$args=array(
'category_name'=>'news',
'paged'=>$paged,
);
query_posts($args);
?>

Instead of showing what I intended, this ignores the sticky characteristic and shows the posts in reverse date order. I had thought I needed to include the argument caller_get_posts set to 1 to ignore the sticky setting, but this isn’t working that way.

Am I misunderstanding the codex doc on caller_get_posts and query_posts? Or are sticky posts really not sticky?

Thanks for your help.