What should Stern do?

That is easier asked than answered.

I am referring to what the NBA should do about former referee Tim Donaghy. He was recently flipped by the Feds as part of an organized crime gambling bust.

It turns out that Donaghy was helping to fix games to meet or beat the point spread.

All over the sports web sites, the poles are which is a bigger black eye on the sport, Bonds and his steroids, Vick and his dog fighting, or Donaghy and his fixed games. As bad as the first two options are, there is no comparison.

Bonds may be well on his way to cheating his way to the most hallowed record in sports, and dog fighting is unspeakable at best, but a dirty ref is goes a lot further. It strikes to the core of the integrity of the game.

It goes beyond what Pete Rose did. When Pete bet on the Reds as a manager, he was betting that his team would win. When a referee bets on a game, or effects a game in another way, it goes so much deeper. It directly effected the outcome of games.

When games are decided by other than players and coaches, so much more is affected. How often does one game change who makes the play-offs or seeding in the play-offs? How many player contracts were affected? How many coaches have been fired because they didn't win enough games?

There is no way of knowing how deep the wounds may go.

What is commissioner to do? Like I said earlier, there is no easy answer.

Can the league survive it? I'm sure it will.

Will the league lose fans? I'm sure it will.

Sports fans will always come back.

Should the league have the right to audit the finances for its officials? I think it isn't too much to ask. They don't have to be made public, just made available to league brass.

Now, this isn't going to be a fool proof system, people will always find ways to hide their ill-gotten gains. I think it may be a good start.

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Full of Hot Air?

I wish they will just make up their mind.

I'm referring to the people who insist on finding alternative fuel sources. It seems that they don't always think things through.

If, like the High Priest of Global Warming Al Gore insists, we have a limited amount of fossil fuels, and a growing thirst for it, we need to find a new way to quench that thirst.

I read a letter to the editor in today's paper that caught my eye. It was attacking the investors interested in putting up windmills. Particularly the ones planned for Wayne County, NY.

It seems that the biggest complaint about them is that they are eye sores.

I am not sure that I buy off on that. I rather like the look of those giant majestic propellers on the sky line. I remember driving over the Altamont Pass, where I-580 passes through the Diablo Range in California, home to over 4000 wind turbines. It is truly a site to behold.

Here is where the hypocrisy comes into play. If there is a way to generate the electricity to run our electric cars, (so we can get away from that evil brew of hydrocarbons we are currently hooked on..) wouldn't it make sense to do it? I mean, where do we currently get our electricity from? Coal fired and nuclear power plants, and dams. The trifecta of evil earth haters.

Shouldn't we want to make that sacrifice? Isn't that what we are supposed to be willing to do? Give something up so we don't feel so guilty about our lifestyles? Isn't that the tithing that we pay to be members of the Church of Inconvenient Truth? Shouldn't we be willing to endure the eye sores so we can avoid drilling in Alaska, and offshore in the Gulf of Mexico? And don't forget all the oil that we import from other countries.

I'm no scientist or engineer, but it seems that we have several viable alternative energy sources, but the tree huggers that force us to seek out such sources shoot us down before we can implement any of them (after all, isn't it better to shoot an oil worker than a spotted owl?).

By the way, what type of fertilizer do you use on a wind farm?