Much has been made about Sen. John McCain’s expertise in foreign policy and his ability to keep the country secure. It is my contention that his performance in the debate on Sept. 26 should cast serious doubts about his ability to play an effective role in international relations. He repeatedly stated that as president he would insure that our military would be able to march out of Iraq after obtaining a victory. I would like to have Sen. McCain describe what he means by victory.

McCain is in real trouble after this debate and I feel he is handling his campaign all wrong. Tonight he was snarly and snide, and seemed frantic the whole time. Obama was smooth, relaxed and empathic and fairly specific in his proposals. He imparted the feeling that we know what he is about, like it or not.

The excellent three-day series on gangs in Napa that reporters Carlos Villatoro, Marsha Dorgan, Jillian Jones and others produced last week was so well received that the biggest concern of the online staff never materialized.

Proposition 2 on the November ballot is designed to make life better for farm animals in California by mandating new standards for humane treatment of animals.

Dear editor,  My name is Benjamin Anderson, a former major and councilman for the city of American Canyon for 14-plus years. I served with Joan Bennett during her first term in 1992. I found her decisions to be in favor of the needs for the city and its citizens. Joan has been on many community committees and many city committees working for the betterment of our city. 

Dear editor, It is time to start passing clean energy laws. We must stop the massive pollution of our planet. We need to make laws that require the percentage of electricity generated by renewable sources increase by 2 percent each year for five years and then one percent after that. This will ensure continual development of renewable energy, as well as not decimating the natural resource industry. We have to act now to have a good planet for our next generation, like me.

Dear editor,  I don’t pretend to know a lot about politics, but it doesn’t take a genius to see the trouble our country is in. Why not bring the troops home from the war and use all those trillions currently used to fund the war to finance the bailout plan? The country might even have enough money left over to help fix the deficit and even send each U.S. citizen a check that most of can use to buy a new muffler for our car, like the last check we received from the government! Just a thought; besides my car is due for a new muffler!

Dear editor, Please verify or challenge the validity of Save Rural Angwin’s statements before printing them. In last week’s paper about the revised Angwin eco-village project (“PUC floats new plan,” Sept. 30), Kellie Anderson’s claim of support for “the preservation of the forest and the farms” is inconsistent with SRA’s support of the 191-unit low income housing project.

Dear editor, A recent letter to the editor from an Angwin resident was surprisingly full of misrepresentations about our eco-village. We at PUC have not seen such a letter in a while, as the majority of the community is thoughtfully engaged in helping shape a new neighborhood that finds common ground with PUC’s needs while improving quality of life for Angwin. Our response:

Dear editor, I would like to take this time to thank the Napa community for supporting the first annual Napa Valley Aloha Festival. The generosity that was shared for the Napa Food Bank was outstanding! What a wonderful community we live in. We look forward to your participation at the second annual Napa Valley Aloha Festival next year.

The economy is on fire and Congress, the Media, and the voters are all fiddling while it burns. We need this bail out, and we need it fast, and it is bailing out not just the big money interests, it is bailing out you and me, it is bailing out everyone. Not enough people seem to get that urgency, and we need to, fast.

Barack Obama chose Delaware Sen. Joe Biden as his running mate ... what do you think of the choice?

(Editor's note: The comments on this crashed about 9:30 a.m Friday, right after McCain's announcement. We were able to rebuild most but not all of the comments)