"No one wants to be investigated, but it is necessary in our world. Sometimes innocent people get accused of crimes they didn't commit. It's horrible, but it is the cost of a fallible system, which is better than no system at all.

Grow up; you can't protect everyone from everything. All you can do is try and protect those who are too young, and too weak to hire a lawyer. Grown ups have the ability to defend themselves, and sometimes they have to. How the hell is a kid supposed to defend themselves if we stack the system against them?"

I'm sorry but that's utterly emotionally manipulative nonsense. The choice is not between falsely accusing some people and no system at all and I love how some people continually and blithely dismiss being falsely accused of a henious crime. Hey, if it's just the cost of the fallible system then YOU shouldn't mind paying that cost, right? You'd be perfectly fine with being falsely accused of molesting your kids because it's just the cost of the system, huh? I doubt it. You have nothing to hide, right? You're not a child molestor, eh? Funny how that cost is fine so long as someone else is paying it.

I don't think anyone has asked to be protected from everything. I don't think not being falsely accused of molesting your kids is asking for special protection from life, but if you are, it's okay because you might be able to afford a decent lawyer so it's all good. Uh huh. How on earth is trying to make the system better so that people are not falsely accused of molesting their kids stacking the deck against kids in general? that doesn't make sense.

Also, in reality, regardless of the system in place, the sad truth is kids can't defend themselves. The best we can hope to do is catch the offendors after the fact and/or before the next victim. False accusations don't help the matter.

"The facts of this case are that an investigation occurred because photos were determined to be questionable, not by a photo clerk, but by everyone except a single beat cop, who felt that they depicted normal camping activities. This is not to discount that one cop, he was presumably right, but why should his opinion on the pictures be placed above his superiors, and the social workers?

Thanks all for your time and consideration of my humble opinions."

That's the facts? Don't think so. Once the clerk handed them in, there had to be an investigation. The system had to follow through. It's not like the there was a vetting process each step of the way and all the parties, except the beat cop, found the pictures questionable and then decided to go to the next phase after each vetting step. Once they were orginally turned over the system was legally obliged to fully investigate period. I think that's Kendra's point, no?

Thank you as well.

"He Said, He Said . . ."

Now the other guy is lying too? Except that he's not and neither was the author but since somebody else could have been lying then well....

"why are so many people defending sex abuse of children"

WOW, just wow. You've gone way off the deep end.

Spot on. We may disagree on the Israeli issue, but, that letter was well done.

And Cary's advice is odd. If a woman I was involved with came up to me and said, "I've spoken to an attorney and/or family estate planner and if we get married I want significant control over our money..." she'd be out the door before she started her next sentence.

The boyfriend might be genially obtuse and I can understand some frustration if he continually suggests stuff she can't afford, but in general, he seems willing to share, his "our house" comment, and has given generously (the birthday/anniversay? trips and "whatnot") without lording it over her so what's the problem?

The problem is not his money or his spending. It's how she feels about his money and what seems to be his occasional spending - it's not like he's throwing away money every minute on nothing. She already seems to resent his money (what she calls her inner class warrior) not because he's playing Richie Rich, which he isn't, but because she came from a poor family. The signs are there - the fretting over what other people spend - the $10 drinks, $25 entrees, the $200 jeans "German" cars and so on. There's no indication that he's forcing her to keep up with the Joneses, and if she insists on going Dutch and doesn't say when she can't afford something (excepting the trip), that's her issue not his.

Not to be the first person to post a letter to my own column, but I just want to say I know I should have written that there are four topics: Religion, politics, Alex Rodriguez and the Tour de France. ...and The World Cup.

Great letter. Best I've read in quite awhile here.

Don't we already know why the Israelis believe they're right? It's not like we don't hear the Israeli version of things, along with the usual propaganda, over and over and over and over and over and over again when this issue heats up up. In fact, in the US the Israeli version is THE accepted version.

I see Laurel's total intellectual smackdown has stirred the pot, and not so surprisingly, proved her very solid points.

After the incessant whining by the Israeli apologists over the past couple of weeks because Salon dared!!! to publish a few articles and/or opinion pieces that were actually somewhat critical of an Israeli action , order has been restored. Now, instead of 99.98% pro-Israel bias in the media we can have a "balanced" 99.99% pro-Isreal bias. Whew, I was getting worried for a minute. I thought I was going to have to cancel my subscription or at least make some noise and pretend that I was going to do something.