I think

DONATE TO THE RED CROSS

This is likely the greatest natural disaster in the U.S. since perhaps the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. It may be worse. As Americans, we need to come together like never before.

GUARDING WHOM? The South desperately needs all the help it can get. National help. National Guard help. Problem is, much of the National Guard is in Iraq. Fighting for oil while Americans at home die, gas prices rise, cities fall and despair sets in. Methinks someone picked the wrong battle to fight. But you already knew that.

JUST SAY NO, ROD Legislators (so far not surprisingly mostly pro-business anti-public GOP legislators) in Illinois are calling on Gov. Blago to suspend state sales tax on gasoline during the current crisis. My lone voice in the wilderness is this: NO! Don't do it! My reasoning: If the state rolls back the gas sales tax 5 percent, you and I both know that retailers, who already are unmercilessly and unconscionably gouging the public, will maybe roll back their prices by one or two percent. That means they line their pockets with the other 3 to 4 percent. How does that help us? Mean time, rolling back the sales tax, which will not help the consumer in any measurable way, will instead, end up hurting the already shakey state financial situation. Any rollback now will mean a larger tax increase later. A tax increase is coming. Don't make it worse than it is.

SORRY SCOTT Scott Tapley's little headline-grabbing crusade took a shot to the bow Wednesday. The CU MTD annexed the neighborhoods he's fighting to separate from the city of Champaign. Now it's gonna be many many times harder for Scott to ride his staggering horse at that pathetic little windmill. Will one portion of government decide that another portion of that same government has acted improperly? Likely? I think not. Don Qui-Tapley vows the fight isn't over. Scott, how much are you willing to spend to save how little? And, by the way, couldn't this problem have been solved by the Champaign County Board taking action? Say, Scott, why don't you contact your local county board member and see if you can get something done. Oh ......... yeah.

SILLY QUESTION Local TV Channel 8 and TV Channel 15 will switch network affilliations Monday (or may be Tuesday, I'm not sure). Does this really matter to anyone (anyone not employed with the two stations)? In the era of cable and satellite TV with 60 or 80 or more networks to deal with, does the switch of two local stations matter? Why?

Pray for the people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

And so it goes.