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Kick valet service notion to the curb
Now that the Roanoke Weiner Stand has secured its spot on the market, patrons could enjoy valet service, if two councilmen have their way.
If Roanokers were frustrated by a lack of downtown parking spaces, folks today would smack their foreheads, celebrate the genius of Councilmen Brian Wishneff and Sherman Lea and wonder why they couldn't have hit on such an inspired solution: valet parking. During daylight hours. For free.
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Waiting for further word from Warner
The commonwealth's senior senator should have more to say about the surge strategy in Iraq.
Virginia's U.S. Sen. John Warner lauded Richard Lugar, his Republican colleague, for publicly breaking ranks with President Bush Tuesday over his Iraq war strategy. Warner's reaction was encouraging. He would do better, though, to add a strong public statement of his own that would build GOP pressure on the White House to look beyond Bush's "surge" and seek a more realistic disengagement strategy that begins bringing U.S. forces home.
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Civil War remembrance
John Long
Long, director of the Salem Museum and a history teacher at Roanoke College, is a Roanoke Times columnist.
So some drunk-driving fool crashes into the Confederate statue outside of the Franklin County Courthouse, causing various parts of Johnny Reb to secede from his body. Unbeknownst to the driver (or the statue), the collision soon provoked another chapter in the debate over how -- or whether -- the Civil War should be remembered.
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Roanoke Valley can be more than cool
Dan Frei
Frei is a Roanoke-based political consultant.
It's one thing to have nice restaurants, hotels and museums contributing to a sense of urban cool in Roanoke, but if we want the Roanoke Valley to be truly cool we're going to want to go a little deeper and get ahead of the economic development curve.
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Thursday's letters can be read here.

For Thursday, Virginia

For Wednesday we will take a look at a proposal by Roanoke Councilmen Brian Wishneff and Sherman Lea to offer valet parking on the market. We will give them points for creativity but note this "solution" creates rather than solves a problem.

For my Sunday column, I'm writing about the lack of candidates in upcoming New River Valley elections. Too many incumbents are getting a free pass, and that isn't healthy for democracy.

Legal attrition
The conservative majority on the Supreme Court forgoes consensus building to redefine fundamental liberties.
When Chief Justice John Roberts was trying to convince the Senate he was the right man to head up the nation's top court, he pledged he would build consensus. "I do think the chief justice has a particular obligation to try to achieve consensus consistent with everyone's individual oath to uphold the Constitution," he told the Senate Judiciary Committee, "and that would certainly be a priority for me if I were confirmed." Promises, promises.
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Sell the state liquor stores
Getting Virginia out of the booze business would provide an immediate financial windfall.
An idea ignored during the first round of the transportation funding debate deserves the renewed attention brought to it by Washington Post columnist Melanie Scarborough. In a May 2005 article for the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy, senior fellow Geoffrey Segal suggested selling off the state liquor monopoly as a way for Virginia to raise a substantial amount for transportation improvements.
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Disposable society shouldn't include pets
By Lee Kayaloff
Kayaloff lives in Roanoke and is supervisor of the South Roanoke Meals-on-Wheels.
Each day 10,000 humans are born in the U.S., and each day 70,000 puppies and kittens are born. As long as these birth rates exist, there will never be enough homes for all the animals.
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Wednesday's letters can be read here.

Coming soon: Regardless of where one stands on the immigration bill, everyone should agree that immigrants held in detention centers should be treated humanely. In the past three years 62 immigrants have died in administrative custody, some because they were denied medication or health care.

For tomorrow, we'll urge the General Assembly to dust off an idea brought up during the 2005 debate over transportation funding: Sell of the state liquor stores to raise a chunk of cash for transportation. Virginia's consumers would get better choice, higher quality and lower prices from the increased competition of a private system, which Virginia could still strictly regulate through the licensing process.

The state would get a big chunk of cash - well over a billion, most likely - from selling ABC's assets, along with an ongoing increase in revenue from licensing fees and property and income taxes.

For Wednesday, we're writing about Monday's four divisive, activist, partisan Supreme Court decisions. The dive to the right heralds bad times for the nation.