We know what happens if your dog gets loose in the city and runs uninvited around somebody else's Mulberry bush -- animal control officers with tranquilizer guns are called, cops are brought in as back up with handguns, rifles, batons and shovels, and the dog-owner is summoned into court where he/she is fined and ordered to pay court costs.

In extreme cases --- when the free-spirited, uppity little mutt has the audacity to bark at people it doesn't know approaching it with a pole and noose -- the dog is pronounced "vicious" and is likely to get shot in the head.

OK .. We know that's how it works. You need to keep your dog confined to your property and expect, when the dog accidentally gets loose, the worst.

So what happens, I'm wondering, when one of the few horses or cows in city limits gets out ... finds a hole in the fence or jumps over it?. Do the same rules apply?

HUTCHINSON -- I disagree with Rev. Jeremiah Wright on many things, but as an American I believe that he has the right to believe whatever he wants to believe and express those beliefs.

My father believed the rights of freedom of belief and freedom of expression were important enough to risk his life in Europe in World War II. I believe those rights were important enough to risk my life in Vietnam.

I disagree with Rev. Wright that the U.S. government is responsible for the HIV virus, but as an historian I know that some of our ancestors gave small pox infected blankets to the Indians.

HUTCHINSON -- I'm not sure I should be saying this aloud because it will probably be considered heresy around here ... but I haven't read, listened to or watched a story on the Greensburg recovery in months. Which means half of the daily edition of The Hutchinson News is useless to me.

I tired of the stories long ago. Sure, I'm pulling for those folks -- who isn't?  And if they need something specific from me, I'm in the book. All they have to do is ask, and I'll do the best I can.

I also understand the media in general and newspapering, specifically -- or did, anyway, back in the day: you gotta have stories; you gotta plug the holes. And Greensburg is an easy story, from an editor's point of view -- it was destroyed by a tornado that sounded like a freight train, for chrissakes, and a peach tree was replanted yesterday ... "Get me a photog and reporter out there, Now! I want a 12-inch story and horizontal and vertical pics of The Sprig! Go, go go!"

Sigh.