The steriod controversy in sports has lead to a sorry publicity stunt by the US Congress. Henry Waxman, surely the top showboat of the House, is demanding that players, mangement and parents show up and testify under oath.

his is sorry because all of us already know just about all there is to know about steroids and sports. The horse is out of the barn. Steroids are common in sports. We do not need more information. We need action.

There are two choices: First, we can accept steroids in the same way that we accepted the NFL's demand for 325 pound linemen and the NBA's demand for 7'+ players. Are steroids really much different in concept from training table meals, food supplements and the like? Second, we can outlaw steroids, create rules that protect the health of the palayers and generally invite Congress and the states to step in and control sports.

The choices are clear and easy. Let's get on with it.

A couple of things tend to get overlooked in the rhetoric on homeland security.

There have been no successful challenges to our security since 9/11. We know the crazies want to hurt us but they have not done it. This is a remarkable success for Homeland Security and the government.

Second, the part that is working is not the airport search and accuse mess. Recently, we went to Las Vegas. Kate forgot her driver's license. She used her COSTCO card and the security people waved her througn. If that is not bad enough, at the Las Vegas airport, we mistakenly entered the STAFF line at security and Kate went right through on her COSTCO card.

"Life is not a static thing. The only people who do not change their minds are incompetents in asylums and those in cemeteries." Everett Dirksen -

Everett McKinley Dirksen was a Senator from Illinois when I was a boy. He was very opinionated but also very effective. He had a talent for getting people to agree with his point of view. He was a Republican on whom two Democratic presidents, Kennedy and Johnson relied to gather votes for landmark civil rights legislation in 1964. Why did those two Democratic presidents have to cross the aisle and rely on a Republican for what most people today think is a Democratic issue? Because they could not be confident of Democrats supporting civil rights legislation. Dirksen broke a long running filibuster by the Democrats and the nation moved forward on civil rights.

After successfully defeating the eighty-three-day filibuster, Dirksen, when asked how he had become a crusader in this cause, replied, "I am involved in mankind, and whatever the skin, we are all included in mankind."

This was one of the greatest days in our history yet few today know the truth of how civil rights became law and of the remarkable man who took control and made it happen.