We have a single rule for Holiday presents: "If you ask for it, you won't receive it." We call it the Iron Law of Christmas, and our kids and extended family can recite it by memory.

Don't get me wrong, this isn't to be curmudgeonly. It's done with humor and as an entertaining family tradition. The marvelous thing about it is: it undermines the consumerist shopping-list culture that has replaced the old insightful art of thoughtful (and often surprising) gift-giving that my wife and I grew up with. As an added benefit, it's also hilarious to watch children and teenagers who are smitten with covetous desire for some product or other try SO HARD not to ask for it.

Instead of spending time making a list of what they want (an insidious slippery slope to the dark side of American culture), children and adults in our family instead spend at least a little time thinking about the recipients of their gift and planning how to happily surprise them on Christmas morning.

The fun of Christmas morning is back in our house since there's no telling what lurks inside the packages. And I learn from my relatives that the gifts we send to brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, and cousins have become eagerly anticipated annual mysteries... 100% guaranteed to NOT be what you asked for.

So to today's letter writer, I say: REFUSE to buy what's on the list. You're their relative, not their waiter! Declare your freedom, buy surprising gifts you hope they'll like, and take pleasure in the giving. Maybe you'll start a fun tradition that catches on in your family!

I was sickened when I learned this morning that the telcom amnesty measure likely was going to pass. Where is the America I revered, where those who knowingly break the public trust are held accountable when they are caught?

Thanks to the telcoms like Qwest that obeyed the law in this matter and were (apparently) punished by our administration for their good faith.

And Thanks to Senator Dodd for restoring a corner of my faith in government. Why is this decency so hard to come by in Congress after 2004?

I suspect Joan was instinctively uncomfortable and "muddled" about watching this interlude because it was a caricature of sexual harassment... somehow a little unfamiliar because the object was a man in a suit and tie and the perpetrator a respected woman.

Reverse the genders in your head and the situation is horribly familiar... a woman reduced to blushing embarrassment and stammering as her words are ignored and her body is pawed by a power figure she feels she can't politely turn away.

Even if Colbert was in on the joke, it was a creepy, unpleasant vibe.