The reason I write nature stories for the paper is to add some
beauty to the often graphic news each day. Thank goodness there
were no crushing head-ons on Dec. 14, but rather another school
shooting. What happens when teachers give up the dangerous
business of teaching? The other item hogging the news was those
child porn indictments. That's bad and I don't know the answers,
but the penalties seem rather inflated, especially in a time of
crowded prisons. One man was facing up to 20 years in federal
prison, and another up to 60 years in federal prison. Does
anyone else think there should be a different kind of punishment
without us citizens having to pay the room and board for a sex
offender for 60 years? It's a system gone to pot.  Punishing a
6-year-old boy for kissing a girl in school, calling it sexually
explicit? Spare me.  — Rex Burress, Oroville