Comments from our readers:

IF CAL RIPKEN and his wealthy investors think a new downtown baseball park is such a great idea, let them pay for it. The Augusta businesses that are supposed to benefit can pay Ripken 50 percent of their increased revenue.

THIS IS A RANT for you drivers. When you get to a traffic light and you are supposed to turn left, you need to go ahead and turn. Quit talking on the cell phone, texting, applying makeup, and go. The light only stays green a certain amount of time, and we don't want to have to sit through the light to wait on you while you are sightseeing.

I LIKE OUR MAYOR, but he needs to start worrying about other things in Augusta besides a new baseball stadium. We need to fix the roads and we need to clean up the crime first. We also need to work to improve the schools. If he does all this for me, a citizen, then he can use my tax money to build as many stadiums as he wants.

MAYBE AREA BANKS should hire security guards to stay at the banks all day. That might cut down on bank robberies in Augusta and Aiken County.

THIS IS A BIG RAVE for whoever has slowed down the traffic on my residential block. I suspect it's sheriff's deputies who have been interfering with the local pharmaceutical trade. Good job!

THIS IS A RANT about Windsor Spring Road. Will Richmond County road maintenance please put a few more shovels full of asphalt in some of the holes. It would be a blessing and greatly appreciated. The people out here do pay taxes, and they do vote.

TODAY I RODE OUT 12th Street to MLK Jr. Boulevard and on to Gordon Highway. The roads were so rough I think I ruptured my spleen. Pave the roads!

THE POSTINGS OF county salaries helps those of us that work hard see that the ones that hardly work make more. Now maybe I will hardly work too and see if I get more money. It seems the less you do, the more you make. How ironic.

THE DEMOCRATS are haughty in victory and all of a sudden experts on all things political. They better realize that they are all riding the coattails of one charismatic smooth-talker, and when his popularity falters they will be stuck with their same old leadership: Pelosi, Reid, Frank, Clinton, etc.

"TURN LANES" on Horizon South Parkway could cost $250,000 to $350,000. Surely, with so much money, a few dozen turn lanes can be built. Then again, maybe they pave them with gold.

A JUICED UP baseball player, Manny Ramirez, holds some hitting records. Are the records legit if he was juiced up? Of course, not. Are any pro athletes truly good these days, or is it just dope?