I am writing about the parking situation at the Uni-versity of Virginia Medical Center. It is, in a word, disgraceful.

In reporting U.S. senatorial candidate Mark Warner’s stump speech in Palmyra on July 19, The Daily Progress described listeners as “125 adoring supporters.”

Barack Obama served only two years in the U.S. Senate before he decided he was too important to be just a senator.

Many of us, born and brought up in America, nurtured in its schools taking part in its public celebrations, recite the Pledge of Allegiance as easily as our family names. Seldom do we consider the meaning of the words we so glibly repeat.

The planet on which Ellen Goodman lives sounds like a very dreary place. At least, that is the impression she gives in her column “Outsourcing labor ... to you!” (The Daily Progress, July 21).

Wild, native cougars do exist and are surviving in the Old Dominion.

In recent months, the Piedmont Group of the Sierra Club has supported a reconsideration of dredging as a key mechanism for providing water storage capacity.

It is not an easy task to admit the futility of further treatment or repeated hospitalizations, but how many of us actually know we have other options?

Although it receives a paltry $1-$1.5 million a year on average, the county’s Acqui-sition of Conservation Easements program has protected 5,560 acres since 2000.

The political cartoon published in The Daily Progress, July 19 reaches a new low in tastelessness.

Land-use taxation and the ACE program are both touted by government as a way to preserve land. But for what purpose?

Is President Bush to blame for all our woes?

For many years Virginia provided the lowest compensation in the country for court-appointed lawyers.

So let’s see …

I would respectfully disagree with the author of “Protester needs to learn history” (The Daily Progress, July 18), who claims in his letter that Thomas Jefferson had nothing to do with our Constitution because he was in France at the time it was written.

After reading the article in the July 17 Daily Progress (“County building’s green roof a tourist draw”), I wondered whether the County Office Building’s green roof success story might be applied to commercial buildings in Al-bemarle County — and whether Albemarle should incentivize builders to install green roofs.

Shame on the Charlottesville Police Department for its confused priorities.

In “Bush warps Jeffersonian principles by prosecuting a ‘war of choice’,” (The Daily Progress, July 13), columnists R.K. Ramazani and Scott Harrop display an impressive familiarity with Jeffersonian quotations — and even with Jeffersonian thinking.

I am a dog owner, and I accept complete responsibility for my dog.

I am pleased to write in response to a letter published July 7 (“County needs to build golf course,” The Daily Progress).

The author of “Liberal dismay for Bush in a nutshell” (The Daily Progress, July 11) employs specious sarcasm to castigate his “liberal” friends for their disagreements with President Bush.

On July 4 a letter writer expresses his opinion that George W. Bush is a “thoroughly good and decent man” deserving of our respect (“Writer’s attack on Bush insulting,” The Daily Progress).

President Monroe’s modest “Cabin Castle” — as he called Highland, later Ash Lawn-Highland — never attempted to compete with Jefferson’s Monticello or Madison’s Montpelier — except in the spring pea contest.

Pit bulls are lucky to have such dedicated advocates in Sara Meehan and the Charlottesville SPCA.

One hopes that the new American citizens sworn in at Monticello that day have a better understanding of our history.

I noticed in the news that our guys in Washington, D.C., have decided to bail out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage companies. Who knew? ’Most everybody I know thought that those organizations were government.

I am not a resident of Charlottesville and generally do not comment on how the residents of the city choose to run their government. However, the July 8 article “City to test its own efficiency” (The Daily Progress) prompts me to make some observations concerning the study.

The Virginia Department Game and Inland Fisheries does not follow up on enough cougar sightings to become convinced that they are real.

Charlottesville claims to be “a world-class city,” but as I read concerning the debate over New York sculptor Charles Keck’s Lewis and Clark statue on West Main Street, something is missing.

As a researcher, I am accustomed to basing conclusions on data and empirical observations. On July 4, I had the opportunity to be a participant observer at the naturalization ceremony at Monticello.