I understand that money talks. I understand voters need to be heard. (See "Best of the Quad Cities," River Cities' Reader Issue 671, February 13-19, 2008.)

In what must be one of the few fun-filled functions in the otherwise beastly boring lives of bureaucrats, undercover operatives try to sneak weaponry through airport checkpoints to test how good Transportation Security Administration screeners are at finding guns, bombs, and knives.

I was angered by the utterly uninformed op-ed piece by a guest columnist Mark Hendrickson on an issue of great importance to our national security. (See "Should the Senate Ratify the U.N. Sea Treaty?" River Cities' Reader Issue 670, February 7-13, 2008.) For starters: the LOS Treaty gives no substantive responsibility to the U.N. - nor, for that matter, did the U.N. "adopt it" as Mr. Hendrickson's screed erroneously states; "U.N." appears in its title merely because the diplomatic conference that negotiated it was convened 35 years ago pursuant to a U.N. General Assembly Resolution.

Ed was just minding his own business. According to an article in the News & Advance of Lynchburg, Virginia, Ed wasn't harming anyone, or threatening to harm anyone, or defrauding anyone.

But that didn't stop the state of Virginia from charging Ed with misdemeanors and felonies and booking him into the crowbar motel sans bail.