The light bulb regulations passed with broad bipartisan support as part of a 2007 energy bill. President George W. Bush signed it.

Since then, the rules have drawn conservatives’ ire, and many former supporters in Congress have flip-flopped. They portray the changes as a ban, a government conspiracy to force all Americans to use dangerous, mercury-laden light bulbs that no one likes.

The truth is something else entirely. Starting next year, old-fashioned incandescent light bulbs will not be banned. They simply must be 30 percent more efficient.

How terrible that America should implement policies to reduce the demand for energy nationwide. No doubt incandescent light bulbs will become more expensive as they comply, but that will only make compact fluorescent bulbs and LEDs more attractive. Those alternatives cost more up front, but consumers save money in the long run by using less electricity.

Less electricity consumed nationwide will mean less pollution from power plants. Those who fret about mercury in compact fluorescents conveniently fail to mention that coal-fueled power plants emit far more mercury into the air.

Some people do find the newer light bulb technologies less appealing, but if they have not tried them recently, they should. Technology and performance improved vastly in the past few years.

None of that appeases Republicans, especially the tea partiers who most fervently subscribe to the light bulb conspiracy theories. The GOP-controlled House yesterday found majority support to repeal the efficiency regulations, but they came up short of the two-thirds majority needed for passage.

Roanoke County Republican Rep. Bob Goodlatte voted for repeal. Salem’s Rep. Morgan Griffith was one of 10 Republicans who voted against the bill. He actually supports repeal but had concerns about states’ rights.

Warner, who had remained mostly out of politics since his retirement from the Senate, might have swayed a few votes. He feared losing momentum even if the light bulb regulations were but a small step toward greater energy efficiency.

Welcome back to the show, Sen. Warner. Virginia has missed your informed leadership.

A series of high-profile cyber attacks have compromised financial data, intelligence and other sensitive information. Over the weekend, a company that works with the FBI reported that someone had hacked nearly 180 employees’ email accounts and posted the passwords online.

The report coincided with a breach at one of Nintendo’s U.S.-based servers and followed the repeated hacking of Sony’s PlayStation Network, which affected personal data for more than 100 million users. Google, meanwhile, announced it had disrupted an effort, originating in China, to steal Gmail account information of human rights advocates and U.S. officials.

The shadowy groups responsible for the attacks have claimed all sorts of justifications for their actions, but the overriding message has been consistent and alarming: Online security is painfully inadequate.

Most Internet users understand that nothing in email should be considered private, but rarely have so many instances of hacking in such a short period of time shown how vulnerable the world’s cyber infrastructure actually is.

Everyone is at risk, and the stakes couldn’t be higher. Every facet of public and private life is connected to the Internet, including the power grid, banking, air and rail transportation and industrial operations. Security has not kept pace with the spread of online services into every aspect of life.

Which, in turn, provides ample opportunity for loosely organized outfits and clandestine government units to wreak havoc on government, personal and corporate services and programs.

Some experts have suggested U.S. and Israeli officials tested the Stuxnet virus before it sabotaged Iran’s nuclear program two years ago. The British confirmed last week that intelligence officials hacked a Yemeni al-Qaida affiliate’s newsletter, replacing bomb-making instructions with a cupcake recipe.

This is the new front for homeland security and the war on terror. It has led Defense officials to conclude, as they revealed last week, that the United States could justify using military force in response to cyber attacks that constitute an act of war.

While it’s not clear how significant or damaging an attack would have to be, the DoD’s position underscores the risks and consequences of a digital world.

Perhaps more disconcerting, however, is the prospect that no matter how much government agencies and the private sector invest in security, it may not be possible to close off every online avenue for hackers.

Whether that gives cause to praise or criticize depends entirely on one’s political point of view.

McDonnell is not governor only of conservative Virginians, though, but of all Virginians. And it is at once heartening that he understands this and disheartening that the political tenor of the times prompted him on Sunday to give graduates of the University of Virginia and their loved ones a succinct reminder of what it is to be American.

Not Republican. Not Democratic. Not Libertarian or a tea partyer or a Green Party member. Just American.

McDonnell was the commencement speaker at Mr. Jefferson’s University. And amid the usual platitudes traditional to the occasion, he spoke directly to an intractable problem of these times: the hyper-partisanship that demonizes the opposition.

“As a Republican,” the governor said, “I believe deeply in the conservative principles of my party. And I know that Democrats believe strongly in the principles of their party.

“While it doesn’t get much coverage, the fact is there are very good people throughout government.

“So let’s make something clear.

“Neither political party has a monopoly on virtue or patriotism.

“Neither political party owns our flag.

“Neither political party cares more about America than the other.”

McDonnell was urging the new generation to a civility sadly lacking in politics.

What he didn’t say that also bears saying: Neither party has every answer to all of the nation’s problems.

At the extreme edges of partisan rhetoric, compromise is made out to be a character flaw, leaving the country ill equipped to settle other intractable problems that truly imperil the nation. Like the national debt.

Perhaps freshly minted graduates of Mr. Jefferson’s University don’t need reminding, but from time to time most of the rest of us do: An essential tenet of representative democracy is that there is strength in the competition of ideas.

Political adversaries are not enemies of the state.

People who believe passionately in certain principles of governance should and do defend them vigorously. But taking a stand and holding it without question is not a matter of honor but of hubris.

Whoever first said that politics is a blood sport recognized an immutable truth: Total victory requires that one side vanquish the other.

To govern a representative democracy, though, takes compromise and cooperation — if governing well is the objective.

Most of the new charges requested by Dominion Virginia Power would cover fuel costs. Last summer’s extreme heat, followed by a frigid winter and the surge in energy costs, have combined to make a substantial boost in power bills inevitable.

The remaining fees would cover needed investments in a natural-gas-fired power plant near Front Royal and improvements to the utility’s transmission network. Dominion executives expect growth will generate nearly 200,000 new customer connections between now and 2015.

None of that is meant to suggest Dominion customers should take their attention off their electric bills. A far more important decision affecting their wallets will be made this fall in Richmond.

Two-thirds of each monthly bill, known as the base rate, covers Dominion’s operational costs.

Under an agreement with industrial customers last year, that rate cannot change until December 2013. But Dominion executives are asking judges with the State Corporation Commission to raise the ceiling on the utility’s earnings from 11.9 percent to 12.5 percent.

Dominion leaders insist they have not exceeded the current 11.9 percent maximum return on equity, which could trigger a future rate reduction. But their request raises questions about whether their profits are poised to surpass that cap.

If the SCC acquiesces, Dominion will have lessened the chances that the monopoly utility will be forced to lower rates in 2013 or thereafter.

Thomas Farrell, CEO of the utility’s parent company Dominion Resources, argued in a legal filing with the SCC against what he calls a “tyranny of the immediate.”

A modest reduction in electric rates in the short term, he contended, will harm customers over the long haul because the utility will find it more difficult to provide quality service and attract investors for its $14 billion in planned capital improvements over the next five years.

Dominion needs its earnings to be “relatively stable and not swing drastically with every shift in the economic winds,” he said.

But Farrell, whose total compensation package rose 44 percent in 2010 to $14.9 million, isn’t asking for stable earnings. He is seeking permission for Dominion to earn more.

How many of his customers are earning 11.9 percent on their retirement funds and complaining that it’s not enough? How many of them had a raise of any magnitude last year? How many small businesses – or big ones – are operating at an 11.9 percent profit margin?

Under a 2007 law heavily influenced by utility lawyers, the SCC cannot consider the multiplicity of extra charges added onto each monthly bill when making decisions about the base rate. But those extra charges are starting to pile up, and more are on the way as a new coal-fired plant begins operations next summer.

Dominion customers will pay higher electric bills regardless of the SCC’s final decision on the utility’s earnings.

But that’s not a good reason to grant Dominion yet another concession that could keep rates artificially high for years to come.

In recent weeks, McDonnell has racked up a number of wins, albeit ones achieved by last minute tinkering, brinksmanship or plays that border on subterfuge.

The schemes push his socially conservative agenda, but also at times fly in the face of his Republican colleagues.

After failing twice to chop state funding for National Public Radio in the General Assembly, he deployed a line-item veto to take $424,000 away from a network that conservatives claim has leftist tendencies.

When he disliked an election redistricting plan backed by many in the GOP establishment, he vetoed it without first telling House Speaker William J. Howell, a prominent Republican. In doing so, he undermined months of work that the Republicans spent on the plan, which will be decided by the courts. “It puts elections in real turmoil,” Delegate R. Steven Landes, R-Augusta County, was reported as saying.

The McDonnell schemes go all the way to Capitol Hill. Unhappy that President Barack Obama had pushed back proposed lease sales of possible oil drilling tracts off the Virginia shore until 2017, McDonnell struck back. Obama delayed the lease sale until further study of offshore drilling safety in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon explosion and spill last year that was the largest environmental disaster in U.S. history.

McDonnell envisions Virginia becoming “the energy capital of the East Coast.” So, working with a fellow Republican, U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor, McDonnell helped push legislation to advance the lease sale again. It passed the Republican-controlled House of Representatives on Thursday by a 266-149 vote, but it faces an uncertain future in the Democrat-controlled Senate.

McDonnell cut his teeth on the art of brinksmanship last year when he championed a plan to restrict abortion funding that squeaked by in the state Senate by a 20-19 vote.

Which gave way, in the Mark Warner and Tim Kaine administrations, to no acknowledgment at all that April is a particularly significant month in the history of Virginia. It is.

In April 1861, Virginia seceded from the Union; in April 1865, the Confederacy it had joined was vanquished with the South’s surrender at Appomattox.

In this sesquicentennial of the start of America’s most tragic war, Gov. Bob McDonnell has proclaimed April Civil War History in Virginia Month in a document of such diplomatic delicacy that no one — neither descendants of slaves nor of Confederates — has, of yet, denounced it.

A singular feat by a governor who last year fecklessly rubber-stamped a Confederate History Month proclamation that sent him stumbling into a bitter controversy over slavery and the true meaning of the South’s “Lost Cause.”

McDonnell learned his lesson, and did this year what he intended last: to focus attention on Virginia’s historic role in the seminal event that defined the United States as we know it today.

And to do so mainly to boost the state’s tourism industry, taking great care to touch all the right rhetorical buttons along the way.

The governor proclaims: “from 2011-2015 a diverse and growing commonwealth will host innumerable public events, lectures, re-enactments, seminars, and remembrances covering every aspect of the war, and no state is more closely connected to this pivotal period of American history, and therefore no state is better suited to host visitors seeking to learn about the Civil War, the Confederacy, slavery, emancipation and the full history of our United States, and for that reason Virginia encourages visitors from across the country and the world to visit the Commonwealth during this period.”

Such bald marketing is a bit jarring amid all of the allusions to an American epoch of such horror and suffering and misplaced ideals.

It is a perfectly good purpose, though — particularly given the times, when so many are feeling the effects of a poor economy.

McDonnell ends his pitch by urging all Virginians to participate in commemorating this 150th anniversary “as we strive to enact the vision laid out in the preamble to the United States Constitution of a ‘more perfect union.’”

The tension between federalists and states’-righters that lingers to this day reminds how wide the political divide remains. The sesquicentennial can profit Virginians most as a reminder, if any is needed, of the folly of a nation taking up arms against itself.

The First Amendment in the Bill of Rights says: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; abridging the freedom of speech, or the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.” There is no more to the First Amendment; this is all it says.

When I was in the third grade, my teacher had a short devotion every day and at the end we were required to say “The Lord’s Prayer” while she walked around the room checking to make sure we were saying the prayer. If we were not, we had to stay inside during recess, which for a third-grader was cruel and unusual punishment.

In 1962, the Supreme Court ruled that forcing students to take part in religious activities was unconstitutional. That was it; nothing more, nothing less.

Over the years, certain courts and groups have altered and distorted both the First Amendment and the 1962 court ruling to forbid any so-called government mention of religion, especially Christianity.

Recently in The Roanoke Times, I have read the following: “There is a crucial difference between government speech endorsing religion and student speech endorsing religion” (”Religious displays permitted,” March 12 news story); “The U.S. Constitution prohibits government from endorsing a particular religion, the ACLU and the Freedom from Religion Foundation said in opposing the Giles County displays” (”Groups agree on students’ rights,” Feb. 26 news story); “The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which calls for separation between government and religion” (”Students in Giles stand up for Ten Commandments,” March 8 news story).

None of the above is in the First Amendment. I do see where this is in the minds of certain people and groups and in the minds of some judges.

The First Amendment forbids the establishment of religion. Established religion means that the state government sets up an official religion that the people are required to join and support, in some cases with a mandatory tithe.

The First Amendment does not forbid government employees from saying prayers at public functions, ball games, etc., nor does it forbid posting the Ten Commandments. Nor does it even forbid government employees from endorsing religion.

There is a huge difference between establishing a religion and endorsing one. They mean two entirely different things and only one of them is forbidden by the First Amendment.

In the 1962 Supreme Court ruling, only forced or coerced religious activities were forbidden.

No one is forced to bow their head and pray at a ball game or PTA meeting. No one forced Giles County students to read, memorize or take a quiz or test on the Ten Commandments.

Those who like to whine that “I’ve got to hear stuff I don’t believe in” get no sympathy from me. I was a student in another country and Islamic activities on campus did not bother me at all. I was tolerant of them even though I am a Christian, and was not hurt or altered by them.

Over the years, there has been a lot of distortion and misunderstanding about the First Amendment’s position on religion, and I think it is time to clear it up. So I am proposing and will ask my congressman to propose a 28th Amendment to the Constitution that defines what establishment of religion originally meant.

Also in the new amendment it should be stated in simple English that what is not forbidden is permitted.

This will get things back to the original intent, and if it is written so that there is no need for interpretation, then courts, lawyers, antireligious groups and others who want to undermine the foundation on which this country is based would have no legitimate argument against expression of religion in a public venue.

Virginia’s public broadcasting dares to provide unique programming that augments and supports the state’s most noble of missions: educating our youth. Cutting that funding would imperil the commonwealth’s ability to expand the educational mission outside of the limits of classrooms. It is from a wealth of experience that I know education is the great equalizer. And it’s not lightly that I take up the pen to speak out against cutting funds for Virginia’s public broadcasting.

With all respect to the governor, Virginia cannot afford to defund our public broadcasting now or in the future. The state Senate understands this, and hasn’t proposed any cuts to public broadcasting in its budget amendments. I hope it will be the pleasure of the General Assembly to restore the proposed cuts while we work with the House of Delegates to finalize the state budget.

Repeated attempts to eliminate funding for public broadcasting in Virginia have been made under the assumption that those expenses don’t support “core functions of government.”

Public broadcasting does support a core function of government, however: It plays a remarkable role not only in helping educators and parents challenge children outside the classroom, but also by substantially enriching classroom instruction through materials created for teachers to use in lessons. This educational support it provides our schoolchildren would be endangered if its state funding is cut.

Research confirms that the public realizes the value of PBS as the No. 1 educational media brand. Some of the findings have shown that children from low-income families who watch even just two PBS programs are more likely to score as much as 46 percent higher on standardized tests than their peers who don’t tune in. Pre-K teachers consistently identify the service as the No. 1 source for online content used in their classrooms. PBS Kids offers nine literacy series and 15 series on science, technology, engineering and math. Few, if any, commercial stations can boast that level of support for education. Simply put, no other station or channel provides the type of service that Virginia’s PBS affiliates offer.

Public broadcasting’s audience is also very important to note. PBS Kids attracts a higher percentage of viewers from Hispanic, African-American and low-income homes compared with their representation in the general population. This is a heartening statistic to hear as we continue working to ensure the achievement gap is closed and that all Virginia’s children have a bright future regardless of their location, regardless of their race or color. Public broadcasting helps us bridge that gap.

Eliminating state funding would leave Virginia’s public broadcasting stations with an uncertain future. Virginia’s stations, like all public broadcast stations, are federally barred from commercial advertising. They can’t legally make up the shortfalls that state defunding would cause with advertisements. Given the unique nature of its educational programming, it’s also very unlikely that the major networks or pay-access channels would willingly find a home for shows that would not be profitable.

The return on investing in public broadcasting is immeasurable in the lives of children who enjoy and learn from its programs. It brings families together, and it advances learning at an early age. For the price we pay, there’s no better deal for the future benefits.

I do appreciate Virginia’s record of fiscal discipline and great financial management, but we owe this resource to the many Virginia children, whether in rural or urban areas, who have limited opportunities to explore the worlds of literacy, language, math, science and the arts. It doesn’t matter whether the barriers children face are geographic or socio-economic. Virginia should do what it can to make sure schoolchildren can overcome those barriers.

If our public stations face crippling shortfalls, they may close their doors or cease to produce the programs that many of us enjoyed growing up. Matters of general public interest may find themselves without a home because of lack of profitability. This includes, as the governor wryly noted, programs such as his speech on the state of our commonwealth.

Unlike the rest of broadcast television, the value of public broadcasting has always been not in the profits it brings, but in the lives it enriches and the minds it helps shape and challenge. In some parts of the state without broadband access, including some inner-city and rural communities, public broadcasting is the only option other than network television.

Now is not the time to foreclose on Sesame Street and put Clifford out on the street. Public broadcasting programs are often the only exposure many children may have to educational programming.  S

In the Senate of Virginia, Henry L. Marsh III represents the 16th District, which includes Richmond, Petersburg, Hopewell and the counties of Chesterfield, Dinwiddie and Prince George.

Del. William Cleaveland, R-Botetourt County, sponsored one of a slew of bipartisan bills in the 2011 Virginia General Assembly to outlaw the sale and use of synthetic marijuana. His was one incorporated into H.B. 1434, which passed the House without a dissenting vote. The Senate passed a similar bill, also without a “no” vote.

In a year when the entire General Assembly is up for re-election, banning synthetic marijuana is one thing risk-averse legislators can agree on.

Synthetic marijuana is made from chemicals related to mothballs. The effects may be similar, but the chemicals are nothing like marijuana. The synthetics contain carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in amounts large enough to make tobacco look like health food in comparison. The comparative safety of organic marijuana is well-established.

The synthetic bills all contain one major flaw. They criminalize personal use. Zero tolerance has done little other than burden otherwise law-abiding citizens with criminal records. Consider the U.S. experience with natural marijuana. Despite more than 850,000 arrests annually, the U.S. has double the rate of marijuana use as the Netherlands, where marijuana is legally available.

Among the primary users of synthetic marijuana are military personnel. This is because synthetic marijuana does not show up in drug tests. Virginia legislators are about to pass a drug law that will disproportionately impact men and women in uniform, some of whom may be self-medicating. Marijuana is widely used by veterans to self-treat post-traumatic stress disorder.

The way marijuana treats PTSD is really quite simple. It helps people forget. This is a godsend to soldiers and veterans haunted by memories of war. Israel has a well-established medical marijuana program. PTSD is a common, doctor-approved justification for medical use among Israeli Defense Forces veterans.

Cleaveland wants to make possession of synthetic marijuana a Class 1 misdemeanor punishable by up to 12 months in jail. Can Virginia even afford to put more nonviolent offenders behind bars? Is this really a top priority during an economic downturn that has resulted in layoffs of police, firefighters and teachers?

The drug war has given the land of the free the highest incarceration rate in the world, with absolutely nothing to show for it. For the same reasons alcohol prohibition failed, the drug war has been doomed from the start. We’re shortchanging our children’s future by prioritizing incarceration over education.

This is, of course, an election year. The root cause of the punitive nanny state is political opportunism. Drug prohibition finances organized crime at home and terrorism abroad, which is then used by shameless politicians to justify throwing good money after bad policy.

Banning the over-the-counter sale of synthetic marijuana is easily done. The feds have largely accomplished this already. Criminalizing users unnecessarily entails expanding big government. Thanks to education efforts, legal tobacco use has steadily declined, without any need to criminalize tobacco smokers.

More drug war is not the answer. A better solution is to ease up on penalties for natural marijuana. The use of synthetic marijuana is an unintended side-effect of the war on real marijuana. Consumers are turning to potentially toxic drugs, made in China and sold as research chemicals before being repackaged as incense for sale in the U.S.

Virginia is about to embark on an endless cat-and-mouse game. Banning the over-counter-sale of synthetics is one thing, but policing the Internet is another entirely. Chinese chemists will tweak formulas to stay one step ahead of the law and two steps ahead of the drug tests. New versions won’t necessarily be safer.

It’s long past time to stop pretending marijuana is more dangerous than legal alcohol, tobacco or prescription narcotics. Marijuana is not nearly as harmful (or exciting) as Virginia’s criminal penalties suggest. Virginia legislators will be making changes to the state’s Drug Control Act. Those changes should include marijuana decriminalization.

It’s too bad reading the Constitution hasn’t long been a practice at the beginning of each new session of Congress. If it had, perhaps our country wouldn’t be in the shape it’s in today. But now begun, it’s a practice that should be continued. Legislators — as well as the public — need to be reminded of what the document they’ve sworn to uphold actually says.

From all the hubbub, though, you’d think the Constitution — instead of being the document that established our government — was some weird manifesto trotted out by a peculiar cult that unaccountably managed to gain control of the House of Representatives.

Democrats, of course, likely do view the Republicans as a peculiar cult. And since the Constitution — in the now infamous words of Washington Post staffer Ezra Klein — “was written more than a hundred years ago” and is, therefore (in his mind, anyway), “confusing,” many people probably do see it as a weird sort of manifesto. After all, it wasn’t texted, tweeted or posted on Facebook, so how relevant can it really be?

With apologies to Chesterton, and Klein notwithstanding, the problem isn’t that Congress has tried following the Constitution, and found it old and confusing. The problem is that Congress has found the Constitution much too constraining and left it unfollowed.

Constraints being so despised in this progressive age, it’s no wonder many in Congress (and elsewhere) prefer to imagine the Constitution to be a living document, endowed with life by the deified judiciary and spreading like kudzu ever since to cover whatever aspect of American life the lawmakers — with only our best interests at heart — want to control.

But constraining government is exactly what the framers had in mind. The men who created the Constitution had a clear understanding of both human nature and the seductive nature of power on the human psyche. They also understood what too few today are willing to see: that freeing the Constitution from constraints has, ironically, the effect of making citizens less free.

Which is why the framers didn’t create the “living document” lawmakers and judges like to think they did. Neither did they create an inflexible document that couldn’t be changed to meet the exigencies of the times. They did, however, make the process difficult so we wouldn’t confuse exigency with fancy, necessity with notion.

Yet as pleased as I am with the Constitution’s reading, and as much as I’d like to see it continue, I doubt it will have any real effect. We’ve moved so far now from the Constitution the framers created that, however many times the Constitution is read on the House floor, it’s likely to act as little more than a bittersweet reminder of what we’ve lost rather than as the brake it should be on the government’s power.

Despite the best of intentions, lawmakers and judges won’t easily relinquish the power to control our lives. With the blessing of the unconstrained Constitution, they’ll continue doing more and more for us even as they take more and more from us — freedom, independence, personal responsibility, self-reliance — until the living Constitution finally drains the life right out of us.

Linda Whitlock is an adjunct English professor who lives in Salem.