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Why don't the car companies borrow money from Exxon? -- Noreen Brown, Richmond

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Goochland County announced that it used sales from 2006 to 2008 for current property assessments. Assessments are 100 percent of a home's current value, but Goochland uses 2006 sales. How can this reflect true current value? How many other areas compute it the same way? -- Dennis A. Wright, Hartfield

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The state legislature is proposing that the sales tax from the activities of the Shockoe baseball facility and related area businesses be used to pay for the new baseball facility. How will the people keeping track of that money from all other tax money know which is which, when for years they could not separate the tax money between the city and Henrico County, to the point that thousands of residents changed their mailing address from Richmond to Henrico? -- R. Dean Decker, Henrico

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Well folks, hold on to your wallets, Obamanation is on the liberal loose. He managed to get the transition to all-digital TV stopped so the "poor people" and procrastinators could get ready, thus depriving the rest of us prepared ones the best signal. Then he includes the "poor" kids in the free health care program. No country, company, or Navy ship can operate with the least qualified, nonproducing, uneducated running the show. Here we go with Rome, down the tubes. -- Gil Davis Jr., Henrico

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Obama's vetting process for Cabinet nominees must be based on the philosophy of don't ask, don't tell. -- Jim Davenport, Richmond

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However you feel about the proposed megabillion-dollar stimulus bill, I give it credit for including $100 million for the re-establishment of white-flag factories, an industry and product that had almost become extinct during the past eight years under the Bush administration. -- Max Maizels, Richmond

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I seem to remember that Al Capone and the Queen of Mean went to prison for nonpayment of taxes, and there was no makeup for either of them. Is there now a double standard for justice in this country? What is the Madoff tax situation? Is the penthouse considered punishment now? -- Mary Lou McFall, Heathsville

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There is a truism that we used in the military: "There's never enough money to do it right, but there's always enough to do it over." We see this in the power outages in Kentucky (and a few years ago here). Gas lines are underground -- why not electricity? Maybe a multibillion-dollar, class-action suit against the electric utility companies would get their attention. -- Charles Ferguson, Colonial Heights

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Gov. Tim Kaine wants to ban smoking in restaurants and bars. I smoked for 26 years and have been a nonsmoker for 22 years. I don't agree. I do think there should be a partition separating smokers and nonsmokers. Nonsmokers should not have to walk through smoking areas to enter a restaurant. Kaine wanted us to conserve gas by changing our driving habits. We did, and now he says that with less gas being used, the state is short of road taxes. So he wants to raise cigarette taxes to cover it. If Kaine were from Virginia, he would know our rich history in tobacco. -- David Carey, Powhatan

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Now that the Bush years are mercifully over, many of his few remaining supporters, such as Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, and Rush Limbaugh are trying to rewrite history by saying that George W. Bush has kept us safe because we haven't been attacked since 9/11. This is ridiculous, because they are acting as if 9/11 never really happened. Just remember that Bush was president on 9/11 and 3,000 Americans died on his watch, and he responded by invading a country that posed no threat to us, costing the lives of 4,000 more Americans and untold number of Iraqis. Rewriting history only works when those who know the truth remain silent. -- Arthur Bailey, Richmond