About the Motor Vehicle Privilege Tax ("City eyes fee rise ," Feb. 13): The traffic violations we have in this city are terrible: running through stoplights, no stopping at stop signs and no yielding. If the police bore down on this problem, the city budget would be in good shape. You can travel on Shattalon Drive and University Parkway and see enough violations to pay City Manager Bill Stuart's salary, plus have some left over for the budget.

Council Member Molly Leight said a $5 increase in the tax was not burdensome. A good idea, yet she was unaware how to spend the revenue.

I am saddened to read about the investigation of Susan Wiseman for allegations of sexual misconduct ("Schools release name of teacher ," Feb. 10). As a parent of a high-school student, I have had the opportunity to get to know her. She is an outstanding teacher and advocate for all teenagers.

I believe she is innocent of the allegations, that she is of high character and has only the best intentions for her students and all teenagers. As she works with students daily in the classroom, I trust that Wiseman realizes the influence she has over them and that she would have no reason to jeopardize her position as a teacher.

It seems the attention and publicity Cindy Sheehan has been receiving has affected her reasoning. To go to the World Social Forum in Caracas, Venezuela, a country that is already anti-American, and make inflammatory comments regarding our president and other leaders was unconscionable and borders on treason ("Sheehan speaks to activists ," Jan. 25).

While I, as well as most Americans, am deeply sympathetic with her in the loss of her son, she has simply gone too far with her activism. While she is a grieving mother, she should remember she is still an American. America has its problems, but is still the greatest country in the world, where we are allowed freedom of speech and countless other freedoms that other countries do not enjoy. If she had made such negative comments about Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, or Saddam Hussein, when he was in power, I wonder if she would be alive to enjoy freedom of speech. She is posing as a peace activist. How much peace is she generating with such comments, which further misunderstanding and hatred for our country?

Please give us back the previous TV schedule so that we can find what is being shown any day of the week. The generic weekday schedule in the Select TV magazine leaves much to be desired. Sporting events and other specials during the week cannot be found on the new schedule.

I realize your Second Reading columnists are hard-pressed to find humor in the goings-on of the state legislature, but I do not understand their referring (Feb. 12)  to the litany of the Moravian Church as Sen. Hamilton Horton's "last laugh" at his funeral, as though the litany were some sort of joke that Horton wanted to pull on his friends.

By pointing out that the litany is nine pages long, are the columnists perhaps implying that it was an amusing way of dragging out the service? Not so: Most of those pages are taken up with four-part music for congregational singing. The litany is actually more sung than read, and moves along with graceful energy, like a river of worship.

The litany is a vital part of the Moravian worship tradition. The preface to the 1969 edition of the Moravian hymnal calls it "the great and comprehensive Prayer of the Church." It is a wonderful choice for a service celebrating the life of a devoted Moravian. From all accounts, Ham Horton left his friends with a lot of good memories and a lot to laugh about - but nobody laughs at the litany.

After reading the letter "Completed " (Feb. 4), I struggled with how to respond to what is one of the many myths about church and state. However, then there was the response under the heading "Misapplied " (Feb. 11), eloquently responding to the meaning of the rest of that sentence: "...or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." The framers wrote the Constitution as a secular document not because they were hostile to Christianity, but because they did not want to imply that the new federal government would have any authority to meddle in religion.

The letter "Do Something " (Feb. 8) asks a great question: What can our elected representatives do to take action against ever-increasing energy prices?

The answer is out in the field. Cornfield, that is. An editorial in the Feb. 3 Wall Street Journal states that U.S. farmers are paid to not grow 40 million acres of corn ("Crude Awakening").

Forty million acres of corn converted to ethanol would go a long way toward keeping energy prices in check by keeping dollars here in our economy and out of the hands of those who now convert petrodollars into weapons to be used against us.

Ethanol production will increase only when our elected representatives refuse to accept campaign contributions from major oil companies.

Our own Sen. Richard Burr is on two committees in Congress that give him enough insight on how to save our country by turning off the imported oil petrodollar spigot.

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