Governor Rod Blagojevich made a last-minute attempt last week to at least show he was trying to get the hopelessly stalled budget negotiations back on track. Blagojevich, who has tried harder to avoid blame for the current overtime session than to actually negotiate in good faith, walked into House Speaker Michael Madigan's office unannounced last week in what was supposed to be a dramatic gesture of goodwill and harmony among Democrats.

It's hard to respond to the specific points Jay Lehr brings up in the first half of his commentary "When Will We Tire of the Fear Mongers?" (See River Cities' Reader Issue 634, May 23-29, 2007) related to the effects of cranberries, trans fats, DDT, freon, and others. He presents a list of these environmental and health fears and claims they are unfounded without giving any specific reasons why.

There are some things I would like to add to and comment upon in Jay Lehr's guest commentary from the May 23 Reader. I'll start by simply saying that it's hard to respond to the specific points he brings up in the first half of his article relating to the effects of cranberries, trans fats, DDT, Freon, and others since he simply presents a list of these environmental and health fears and claims they are unfounded without giving any specific reasons why. Dr. Lehr simply lists them all, each with a sentence, and tells us they were all wrong without taking into account any sort of research people have spent their lives working on in these areas.

 From the lack of recognition given to such work, it seems as though Dr. Lehr is implying: "What you have said and done was a waste of time; you are simply wrong." Then to tie everything together by a sort of analogy, all environmental and health scares which Dr. Lehr can remember, which we would assume to be many on account of Dr. Lehr's position as a science director, have never "proved to be true."

I never really wanted an intern. I'm sort of a lone wolf who prefers to work alone. But a longtime friend of mine, Jim Nowlan, pretty much demanded that I take on one of his prized students, Paul Richardson, as an intern this legislative session. I resisted at first, but eventually met with Paul and was impressed.