The leadership positions in some of Cape Girardeau's major institutions might have the best COMBINED talent that Cape has ever seen.

Mayor AL SPRADLING III brings an intelligent, knowledgeable, open, fair-minded and objective leadership to our city government. He is supported by the low-key, professional, out-of- sight leadership of City Manager MIKE MILLER.

Two key city department heads, Chief of Police RICK HETZEL, who brings a communicative and aggressive approach to containing, reducing and processing crime ... and Fire Chief DANIEL WHITE, who has added the medical support and continued quick response time for our much above-average fire department.

President DALE NITZSCHKE is continuing to move Southeast Missouri State University forward through a maze of much-needed changes.

School Superintendent DAN TALLENT is confidently leading our Cape system in implementing its new capital improvements program. A new high school, elementary school (plans for building should be ready for bid in 30-60 days), vo-tech school (also in the planning stage), remodeling additions and closure of other schools are all moving forward.

NOTRE DAME can now see the building progress of its new high school which is under way. SISTER MARY ANN FISCHER provides solid direction here.

Cape Chamber President JOHN MEHNER and Cape Girardeau Area Industrial Recruitment Association Executive Director MITCH ROBINSON are both riding the waves of recent successful industrial growth announcements for this area and are getting better and more recognized for their skills each day.

Convention and Visitors Bureau Director MARY MILLER is providing enthusiastic, strong leadership for this important economic and public relations community endeavor.

Both hospitals, ST. FRANCIS and SOUTHEAST MISSOURI (two of the largest employers and most important services) are capably and professionally led by JIM SEXTON and JIM WENTE.

DAN OVERBY is being praised for his work at the PORT AUTHORITY and is now starting to be able to announce new plant and port usages he's worked on for years. The new Nash Road extension which will give a direct connection to I-55 is already starting to generate a return on its investment.

JACKSON is suffering normal growing pains (which beats retrenchment or the pains of downsizing) under what I feel is excellent leadership under Mayor PAUL SANDERS who has displayed wisdom and common sense.

The area's elected political leadership of U.S. Rep JO ANN EMERSON, state Sen. PETER KINDER, state Reps. MARY KASTEN and DAVID SCHWAB, Presiding Judge GERALD JONES and our other county officials have proved to be solid and they are available to the public.

We have many strong religious leaders as indicated by the growth of church attendance and the financial commitments to new facilities.

ALL in ALL ... we can be thankful for all of these leaders, and many more, who expose themselves to second guessing, media scrutiny and criticism while providing us with their best efforts for better communities.

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EPA clean air rules: GOP members of a Senate environment panel sharply attacked the EPA's efforts to tighten air quality standards, accusing a top EPA deputy of distorting the economic impact of the new rules. "I think you've been blatantly dishonest with the American people," James Inhofe (R-Okla.) told Assistant EPA Administrator Mary Nichols. She tried to justify the new standards, which call for reductions in ground-level ozone and particulate matter.

Inhofe accused Nichols and EPA Administrator Carol Browner of consistently understating the financial burdens of implementing the new rules on soot and smog. The EPA has said the rules would require advanced pollution control equipment on utilities and smokestack industries, but Inhofe said the costs borne by these industries would trickle down to the consumer. He said electric utility rates could rise by 8 percent, and the annual cost of implementing the rules could reach $150 billion. Confronted with a barrage of criticism, Nichols defended the new standards, saying the health benefits would be enormous and that the EPA is willing to work cooperatively with the business community. -- R&P Report

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Frugal financing: A new report indicates that states may cut taxes by as much as $4.4 billion next year and that spending increases will likely be the lowest since 1993. The report was issued by the National Governors' Association and the National Association of State Budget Officers. According to the report, New York Gov. George Pataki has proposed the largest tax cut, a $1.9 billion net reduction. The report also cited Minnesota, Connecticut, Iowa, Ohio and Massachusetts as other states with big income-tax reductions. -- Stapleton's Missouri Political Newsletter (Note: This was before Missouri announced it may be voting on a 1-cent sales tax increase for transportation.)

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Talk of balancing the budget by 2002 is a sham. Even if one takes the revenue and expenditure estimates seriously, the national debt will continue to rise.

Why does the national debt grow more than the alleged budget deficit number each year? Because the Beltway engages in accounting that in the private sector would land you with lawsuits, if not a jail term. Take Social Security, which is supposed to be a separate trust fund. Social Security is currently generating surpluses (which will turn negative around 2012) because of the baby boomer demographic bubble. Washington theoretically borrows these surpluses to cover its shortfalls. Yet for the balanced budget number, those borrowings are counted as revenue. Can you imagine borrowing and then counting that money as sales? Last year, the official budget deficit was $107 billion. The real spending shortfall was over $170 billion.

We're told that the last time Washington didn't run red ink was in 1969. It's longer ago than that. Outgoing President Lyndon Johnson achieved that feat by including the Social Security surplus. Prior to that, the national pension plan was truly off-budget.

Of course, the government's estimates for out-years (future) spending are hardly worth the paper they are written on. For example, in 1965 when Medicare was launched, we were told that, adjusted for inflation, outlays for this program would be a little more than $10 billion by early 1990s. Instead, they were over $100 billion. Estimates of future Medicare and Medicaid spending have traditionally been wide of the mark.

Washington also makes the absurd assumption that changes in the tax law don't affect people's behavior. That is why the Congressional Budget Office can declare, with a straight face, that a cut in the capital gains tax would cost the government money. However, every time the rate has been cut, revenues have surged. (And how meaningful would an Alice-in-Wonderland balanced budget be in the face of Social Security's $9 trillion of unfunded liabilities?) Yet based on this flaky process, a number of Republicans seem ready to ditch meaningful tax relief, not to mention tax simplification. -- Steve Forbes, Editor-in-Chief, Forbes Magazine

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For the record: Ready for that tax cut? According to Joint Economic Committee data, federal tax receipts hit an all-time high at 21 per cent of gross domestic product in the fourth quarter of 1996 and the first quarter of 1997. When President Clinton took office, receipts were at 19 per cent. Says STEVE FORBES, "Never in American history has one man taken so much from so many for so long."

Media Research Center survey finds that 30 per cent of criminals portrayed on TV are business owners or executives; career criminals are a distant second among TV bad guys at 10 per cent ... Not surprisingly, Wall Street Journal poll finds that only 37 per cent of Americans have a positive view of corporations.

Census Bureau reports that the percentage of households headed by married couples continues to drop; last year married couples headed 53.7 per cent of all households, down from 56 per cent in 1990, 60.8 per cent in 1980, and 70.5 per cent in 1970 ... In the Assault on Parenthood Dana Mack reports that Tracey Ullman returned her child from California to England to escape outcome-based education. Says Ullman: "In California everything is s-o-o-o touchy-feely. They are into this silly outcome-based education, where it doesn't matter if she knew how to spell her name as long as she knew who she was...What a crock! She was going to end up as dumb as a mud-flap." -- National Review

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Valuing "liberty of conscience": Recently the U.S. State Department issued its first report on religious freedom. In it, Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, eloquently spoke about the importance of religious freedom in America and around the world. She quotes her predecessor, Thomas Jefferson, the first secretary of state: It "behooves all who value liberty of conscience for themselves to resist invasions of it in the case of others; or that case may, by change of circumstances, become their own." Secretary Albright's report is most welcome. She confirms what many of us have been saying for years: Persecution of Christians for their faith is real, widespread and intensifying.

The report contains a country-by-country survey of the world scene on religious freedom. It details the plight of Buddhists, Bahais and Muslims, as well as Christians. Much of this will equip religious liberty advocates for years to come and is therefore quite welcome. But the language of the China section is very cautious. Unlike other sections of the report -- such as Egypt, Iran and Sudan -- which speak bluntly of killings, torture and imprisonment, the China section speaks of government "bars" and "bans" and refers to Chinese authorities' "tightened restrictions." In no place does the report charge China with religious persecution. Especially revealing is the section outlining U.S. government actions in response to the religious situation in China. It is a mere catalogue of conversations. The careful reader will learn that in response to some of the most pervasive Christian persecution in China in this century, the government of the world's remaining "super power" responded with -- talk. -- Gary Bauer

~Gary Rust is president of Rust Communications, which owns the Southeast Missourian and other newspapers.