Whenever we start talking energy independence, we immediately turn the conversation to high-tech, not-quite-invented-yet gadgetry. As if technology can save us from ourselves. It might, and I'm by no means anti-science, and I welcome all advances in energy efficiency and alternatives.

I am, however, against the idea that we don't have to make any fundamental changes in our personal lives, that technology will somehow fall out of the laboratories in the sky to save us.

While we're researching energy technology, we also need to address the boring stuff. Increased funding for public transit. Park and ride lots and garages all across the suburbs to make public transit more feasible in the sprawl. Funding for bike lanes, sidewalks, and crosswalks. Changing suburban planning that is entirely dependent on individual cars. Emphasis on rail travel (both freight and passenger). Weatherizing houses. Giving tax credits to businesses that enable telecommuting. Finding innovative ways to increase ride-sharing. Providing safe routes to schools so kids can walk and bike. Recycling incentives. Composting. Charging a national fee for paper or plastic shopping bags.

All that stuff adds up tremendously, if done on a national level, and it doesn't make the headlines. It's boring. It's like eating your veggies. We know it's good for us, but we eat too many Big Macs instead.

It's been a helluva run.

Thanks for Opus, and Cutter John, and the Banana PC Junior, and Oliver Wendell Jones, and Binkley, and his anxiety closet, and Steve Dallas, and Lola Granola. And Bill the Cat, of course. I'll miss them all.

Thanks for sticking to your guns, and leaving this space in my Sunday funnies for some new artist to show us their stuff. I hope I make a new friend or two. Because artists like you are willing to move on and not live in re-runs, I've come to love Get Fuzzy, Stone Soup, and Pearls Before Swine. Thanks for giving someone room--someone whose creations I don't know yet.

Thanks for The Meadow Party.

Thanks for everything.

You're the best.

I could have written this letter, except that it's my mom, not my MIL.

I'm a liberal, was a Unitarian for a while, and am now a happy atheist. I was raised as a conservative Catholic. My mom still decidedly is. Her views, her world, and her beliefs seem to narrow with each year.

During one ranting conversation when she carried on about abortion, I told her we needed to agree to disagree. After much convincing that we wouldn't convince each other, she agreed.

That's not to say I don't have to remind her about once a year that:

A. We have different beliefs.

B. She is not allowed to talk religion with my children.

C. She is not allowed to show Veggie Tales videos to my children.

(lately)

D. I think Barack Obama will be a fine president.

E. I love her and respect her beliefs even if I don't share them.

F. I expect the same from her in return.

It happens once a year, usually over email (when she sends a rant from some friend or other). I trot out the same conversation. Again. And she calms down for a year or so, and I can love my mom in peace without worrying about what the Pope said lately.

So don't talk details. Talk mutual appreciation for differing beliefs, talk mutual love of son and kids, and leave it at that. Encourage your husband to do the same.

Best of luck.

... my own mom has about gay people. As a small town conservative Republican Catholic, gay people are the antichrist. Just fill in any other derogatory term and it would fit... bank robber, meth dealer, child molester, sociopath, etc. All synonymous with "gay" in my mother's lexicon. There is no middle ground. It is black and white, absolute. Allowing gay people the legal right to marry, in my mom's world view, would be like inviting the meth dealers into the elementary schools.

This is the same thinking that sent raving throngs into the streets over school desegregation. Popular vote over civil rights in some parts of Mississippi or Alabama probably still wouldn't grant full personhood to black people.

The other posters on this thread are right. This will never be decided by popular vote. This issue will eventually end up in the Supreme Court, and like Brown v. Board of Education or Roe v. Wade, this issue will be decided nationally by the courts. With any luck, this will happen during an Obama administration, where we all know he will appoint justices who would be left leaning.

My heart goes out to you Andrew. An excellent tribute to your father. Thank you.

... who voted Democratic in this election.

Good hunters are passionate about habitat preservation. They understand the state Fish and Wildlife departments' game allocation rules, and they understand that a healthy habitat, with some predators, means that they'll have deer and elk to hunt this year AND in the future. Republicans, specifically the Bush II administration, haven't exactly been friends of wildlife, and no one knows that more than hunters.

One hunter friend in particular dropped his NRA membership because they have become too radical. He understands the need to own a hunting rifle or two, but thinks no average Joe citizen needs an AK-47. I agree with that also.

There is a lot of common ground between hunters and a lot of principles currently in the Democratic party. Don't write them off. Hunters are not all gun-toting rednecks. While I'm not likely to buy a rifle soon, I can see that we have a lot in common. If women want to get into hunting, more power to them! That's more people to care about healthy wildlife habitat and the outdoors.