CIVIL-RIGHTS HEARINGS, CHURCH SIGNS AND THE REAL GENDER GAP

Besides my normal workload, it's been a busy week. I went to Chicago Easter weekend, which is always a good reminder that Cape's a good place to live and be from when visiting the heavily trafficked larger cities.

Then I spent Wednesday afternoon through Friday morning in Kansas City at a joint Missouri-Kansas meeting of the federal Civil Rights Advisory Committee. It was quite enlightening as to hate crimes (really very few reported) and profiling (some believable examples were presented during our all-day hearings.)

Few were aware at the hearing, but a concern of mine is that the CLINTON-GORE-RENO trio have a little politicking in mind with the timing of these hearings and expected reports. Some of these studies have the potential to create more racial disharmony than does or should exist.

I prefer to look on the positive side, and much of the testimony in Kansas City did just that, reporting on police, church and individual activities to see that everyone is treated equally and that those who violate the law are punished. (Of six cross burnings in the last nine years in a four-state area, the seven people involved were arrested and served time in jail.) We don't need more laws. We just need more honest communication and enforcement of these laws we have.

* * * * *

JOHN TLAPEK, chairman of the board of three Cape businesses, got a rare experience recently when he attended KEN BLANCHARD'S (author of the "One-Minute Manager") seminar in Chicago, (as reported on our Monday business pages).

Twenty leaders were selected to participate in this three-day seminar on the new book, "Leadership by the Book," co-authored by Blanchard and BILL HYBELS, leader of WILLOW CREEK CHURCH in a Chicago suburb that Wendy and I attended over the Easter holiday.

The book cites JESUS as a source for practical lessons in effective leadership. Besides religion, JESUS was one of the greatest leaders of all time in motivating, helping, loving and getting people to accept and follow him.

* * * * *

Signs on church property:

No God -- No Peace. Know God -- Know Peace.

Free trip to heaven. Details inside!

Try our Sundays. They are better than Baskin-Robbins.

Searching for a new look? Have your faith lifted here!

Have trouble sleeping? We have sermons -- come hear one!

People are like tea bags -- you have to put them in hot water before you know how strong they are.

God so loved the world that he did not send a committee.

Come in and pray today. Beat the Christmas rush.

When down in the mouth, remember Jonah. He came out all right.

Sign broken. Message inside this Sunday.

Fight truth decay -- study the Bible daily.

How will you spend eternity -- Smoking or nonsmoking?

Dusty Bibles lead to Dirty Lives.

Come work for the Lord. The work is hard, the hours are long and the pay is low. But the retirement benefits are out of this world.

It is unlikely there'll be a reduction in the wages of sin.

Do not wait for the hearse to take you to church.

If you're headed in the wrong direction, God allows U-turns.

If you don't like the way you were born, try being born again.

Looking at the way some people live, they ought to obtain eternal fire insurance soon.

This is a ch--ch. What is missing?" (UR)

Forbidden fruit creates many jams.

In the dark? Follow the Son.

Running low on faith? Stop in for a fill-up.

If you can't sleep, don't count sheep. Talk to the Shepherd.

An ad for St. Joseph Episcopal Church has a picture of two hands holding stone tablets on which the Ten Commandments are inscribed and a headline that reads, "For fast, fast, fast relief, take two tablets."

When the restaurant next to the Lutheran church put out a big sign with red letters that said, "Open Sundays," the church reciprocated with its own message: "We are open on Sundays too."

A singing group called "The Resurrection" was scheduled to sing at a church. When a big snowstorm postponed the performance, the pastor changed the outside sign to read, "The Resurrection is postponed."

* * * * *

Real gender gap in politics: New polls show George W. Bush gaining among women, but Al Gore still lags behind with male voters.

The Democrats have a gender problem. They seem to be having trouble getting men to commit.

While pundits, pollsters, and the media make the most of the Republicans' troubles with soccer moms, the Democrats' difficulty with dismayed dads barely gets a mention. Yet the male gender gap -- the preponderance of their support for Republicans over Democrats -- is greater than the much-vaunted women's divide.

"The Democrats have a men problem, and it may be bigger than the Republicans' women problem," says Anna Greenberg of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Mass.

While Bush is working to cut into Gore's support among women by softening the hard-right image he projected in the primaries, Gore doesn't appear to be putting the same effort into courting male voters. In fact, his much-joked-about adoption of earth tones and the hiring of Naomi Wolf, feminist author of "The Beauty Myth," to retool his image hasn't exactly helped him with the lunch-pail set.

But he ignores the male vote at his own peril. A poll released yesterday found that Gore and Bush have pulled even among women, at 39 percent each, while Bush has a 13-point lead among men.

But Gore could have plenty of opportunity to turn that around. Men are more inclined to switch party allegiances and vote independently, making them, in some pundits' estimation, the real swing voters.

So why don't the media ever talk about the Democrats' man problem? -- Alexandra Marks,

The Christian Science Monitor