What in the world is newsworthy today? I watched the "Today Show" everyday for five days and finally on a Saturday. Most of the time they talked about Lance Armstrong taking dope. Who cares? This should be talked about from within the circles of the Olympic committee. These people who use dope get off with no penalties, only a slap on the wrist with a wet noodle.

Then there is all this hype about a football player named Te'o. These guys don't deserve front-page coverage. Of course the news media thrives on such junk news as this.

When we read about a hostage situation around the world, we hear about it once or twice, then it's gone. With all that is going on in our country, we don't need all this back page news about dopies and football players. If it is something we should know about, news media's don't say much about it.

Recently I wrote about Sen. Harry Reid being accused of a scheme to get $600,000 from some businessman. I looked through the paper after that and lo and behold, not one word about the article, how refreshing. I guess the word "extortion" doesn't mean what it did when I was a young man. It's just like the word "treason" it is now called conspiracy and "illegal" is called undocumented.

Guess I'll have to return to my old English class to get updated. That's my opinion and I'll stick with it.

Charles V. Lyerla

Troy