The Napa Valley Education Foundation is a local nonprofit organization with a mission to support educational opportunities for all students enrolled in the Napa Valley Unified School District — American Canyon, Napa and Yountville cities — more than 17,000 students, which is approximately 83 percent of all students in public schools throughout the entire Napa Valley.

One last time on the credit crisis, then I promise to stop, but I have to post this.

The San Francisco Chronicle ran a story Sunday about how people up in Siskiyou County, near the Oregon-California border, are so upset with the state and Federal government that they and four nearby counties want to secede. The idea is to form a new state called "Jefferson."

The excellent three-day series on gangs in Napa that reporters Carlos Villatoro, Marsha Dorgan, Jillian Jones and others produced last week was so well received that the biggest concern of the online staff never materialized.

In the end, the system worked, in its own halting, imperfect way. Now, we can only hope that the $700 billion package passed by the House of Representatives and signed into law by the president Friday performs the hoped-for trick of unlocking the credit markets and averting economic disaster.

Dear editor, What a shock to hear I am not registered to vote! When I phoned the Napa Election Department to request an absentee ballot, that was the news. Since I have been a faithful Napa County voter for over a decade, I could not believe my ears. This election is so important that I will share the details.

Dear editor, I am concerned about the closing of the polling places. I have spoken to many people who like the American tradition of going to their polling place to vote with the community. I was told that not enough people have been going to the polling places. I do think that this year we have a different situation. I believe that more people than ever have registered to vote. This is an important election. I bet that if you did a survey, you could find both people to fill up the polling places and people who would volunteer to work for the election. Let’s try it.

Dear editor, Eric Daniel’s September 28 commentary is a clear and seemingly well-reasoned articulation of the reasons we should support Proposition 8, the gay discrimination measure, this November (“Vote yes on 8, support traditional marriage”). There are, however, a few of his points that need clarification.

The economy is on fire and Congress, the Media, and the voters are all fiddling while it burns. We need this bail out, and we need it fast, and it is bailing out not just the big money interests, it is bailing out you and me, it is bailing out everyone. Not enough people seem to get that urgency, and we need to, fast.

Barack Obama chose Delaware Sen. Joe Biden as his running mate ... what do you think of the choice?

(Editor's note: The comments on this crashed about 9:30 a.m Friday, right after McCain's announcement. We were able to rebuild most but not all of the comments)