The state budget deficit is causing lawmakers and the governor to look at some pretty painful possibilities in terms of cuts. Here's a letter from a woman who resides at the Wilmington Residential Facility for Women, which was mentioned in a Feb. 3 article detailing programs that might have to go.

Readers were not at all happy with the changes The N&O made in its
Sunday comics offering. The paper took the section down from six pages
to four in order to save expensive newsprint in these times of economic
crisis. Find a couple letters on tomorrow's editorial page and some
more here.

In case you're just surfing in to the main Opinion Shop page and haven't discovered the other items that live here, check out the extra letters from this week by clicking on the letters tab above. There are letters on Catholic bishops and same-sex marriage, on J. Peder Zane's columns about the Confederate monument at the state Capitol and on the Children's Psychiatric Hospital in Butner.  There's also a new roundup of editorial cartoons from McClatchy artists under the Cartoons tab.

Readers weigh in on Ruth Sheehan's column this week taking the Catholic bishops of Raleigh and Charlotte to task for supporting a ban on same-sex marriage.

Here is another installment of letters from N&O readers about the stimulus package.

The editorial department met with members of The N&O's community panel Wednesday and answered questions about what we do. (If you'd like to be a member of the community panel, contact Ted Vaden at tvaden@newsobserver.com.). Then today, John Drescher, the paper's executive editor, told me he was speaking to some elementary-age children about letters to the editor, and he asked me how many we average, how many we print and what advice I would give to letter-writers. It occurred to me that might be information that other people are interested in. Here's my response to John. I would note that we have posted nearly 800 letters online-only this year, too, so that's another benefit of this blog.

Readers offer well-timed letters of thanks to several Triangle entities, including Golden Corral. Tell us who deserves your thanks.

Readers offer their take on whether U.S. taxpayers should bail out the automakers. Be sure to read more letters on the subject in Sunday Forum this Sunday.

More readers offer their feelings in the wake of the election.

In these post-election letters, several readers reminisce about life in a segregated South and say they're proud of how far the country has come.