I'm glad the conventions are over and am anxious to see if these candidates can get beyond the attack ads. The vice presidential debates should be interesting, I can't imagine two men more different than Cheney an Edwards.

An issue that is receiving more statewide attention here is education. Bush's "No Child Left Behind" program is not viewed very positively in this state by either the Republicans or Democrats. I'm faced with sending my oldest child to kindergarten this fall. We're pretty committed to the public school system, both my wife and I went to public schools which prepared us well for college and careers. Our neighborhood public elementary school is celebrating the fact that 60-70 percent of the students are now passing basic proficiency tests in reading and math. 60-70 percent passing doesn't instill much confidence in me, 30 to 40 percent are failing. Funding for the public schools is a huge issue-teachers are faced with buying basic supplies out of their own pocket. I'm now understanding why so many people in our area send their kids to private schools. Is this similar to the rest of the country? I don't feel like our local schools should be funded by the federal gov't, but our governor is slashing and capping budgets across the board. More parental involvement, financially I mean, seems to be the answer, but in our city we've got open enrollment in public schools meaning kids are bused in from all over the city. Income levels for about 40 percent of the kids in our school are at or below the poverty level-meaning those parents probably aren't going to contribute in any meaningful way. It's a tough issue with long term ramifications.

Glad you hung around Craig.

M22's, VP150, QS4's, HK 630, HSU VTF3-MKII