Quick, who adheres to a more optimistic view of the world - American progressives or conservatives? For too long, especially since the early-1980's when millions fell for the sunny charms of Ronald Reagan, there has been a persistent myth in American politics that the ideological right offers a more optimistic vision of humanity and its future.

You never know what's going to spark a controversy or launch a movement. Fifty-three years ago, a woman in Alabama helped start the modern American civil rights movement simply by refusing to give up her seat on a public bus.

House Speaker Joe Hackney and Senate President Pro Tem Marc Basnight both indicated yesterday that they expected the General Assembly to adjourn the 2008 session late next week - probably Friday July 18.

With the General Assembly poised to complete its work on the 2008-'09 budget this week and the Easley administration entering its final months, now is a good time to begin to consider what state policymakers have wrought, what might have been, and what we all should be working toward in years to come.

Running a place like the North Carolina Senate is no easy job. The place if crammed with 50 oversized egos and surrounded by scads of staff, reporters, lobbyists and hangers on. In addition, the group is formally divided into two warring political parties and, less formally, countless other groups and alliances-each bent on group and individual self-preservation and, occasionally advancing an actual policy agenda.