Next month, officials at the downtown library will decide what they'll do: knuckle under to the county executive and order librarians to keep internet filters on the library's computers, or remove the filters when adults ask them to.

It's an interesting civil-liberties issue. And it's a heck of an interesting political drama. The county exec, after all, is running for re-election this year. If the library hangs tough, and if Maggie Brooks follows through on her threat, the downtown library could close. And, some speakers at last week's hearing said, so could some suburban branches, which depend on the downtown library for services.

Brooks would have to wait until she drafts her 2008 budget to act, but this could certainly be a campaign issue. So here's a question: might this controversy threaten Maggie's re-election?

You've got to be kidding, hooted a local Democrat I talked with last week. Speakers at last week's hearing may be upset by her threat, he said. And City Newspaper may be upset by it. But most of our fellow Monrovians are on Maggie's side on this issue.

Well, probably. Maybe Steve Minarik even thought this one up. And I'd bet that the Democratic Party won't want to drape itself in the ACLU banner in the county exec race. Virtue is good, but winning's better. Virtue cost Bill Johnson his race for Maggie's office.

And anyway, conventional wisdom says the Dems don't have a chance at defeating Maggie. People aren't exactly lining up to run against her.

Still, our county exec is facing some tough issues. The county has major financial problems, and the Republicans don't dare raise taxes to solve them. Maggie's "community solution" may involve taking money away from every suburban town and school district in the county. The ire of suburban supervisors and parents may offset the love she gets from the library internet issue.

Maybe the library board will cave, figuring that an open library with locked internet filters is better than no library at all. If that's the case, everybody except us diehard liberals will have forgotten about the issue come election day.

If not? Well, the campaign sure won't be dull.

On Imus: Yes, "nappy-headed ho's" was a racial slur. And yes, it was a sexist slur. (And as too many women and girls know, "sexist" is way too mild a word for the humiliation and fear that words and leers and gropes can create.)

But what took place on the Don Imus show was also bullying. Grade A bullying, by a couple of men who get a kick out of parading their superiority, grinding people under their feet, and encouraging listeners to do the same. (You can say that bullies are trying to mask their own insecurity, but it's the victims of the bullying, not the perps, who feel the hurt.)

This is not an issue of political correctness, as some Imus fans are insisting. Racial slurs, homophobic and sexist taunts: all of them foster hate. And hate can be very, very dangerous. So can bullying. And why would any adult find humor in laughing at people?

Well, Imus is off the air (temporarily, I assume), and the story will be dead before long. But a few things mystify me.

First, why only Imus? The program's producer, Bernard McGuirk, referred to the Rutgers-Tennessee championship game as "the Jigaboos versus the Wannabees" (the Jigaboos, apparently, being my team, the Tennessee women). Where's the firestorm over McGuirk?

Some Imus supporters insist that he just made a mistake. Maybe they're right. The folks at CBS and MSNBC have been countenancing this kind of humor for years, pulling in the audiences and making money - as have the advertisers who are now so upset. Why should Imus think that bullying college girls would be out of bounds, equal-opportunity oppressor that he is?

The folks who should be doing the most soul searching, though, are the reporters and columnists who have gone on the show. These are the people, as several commentators have noted, who should have been taking him to task. But the lure of radio and television seems to do something to a lot of print journalists. It apparently gives them a fame that they're hungry for. So when Imus called, people like Tom Oliphant and David Brooks and Frank Rich hung up their objectivity, walked into his frat party, and had a good ol' time. And now they give the excuse that his was a "serious" program.

You bet it was.

Mall wars: Irondequoit Mall, now known as Medley Centre, has another new owner, and the D&C has been quoting business owners and area residents who are hopeful and optimistic. On Thursday, the D&C's editorial writers (known as This Page) urged the new owner to "immediately find a replacement store for Bon-Ton," and urged shoppers to "give this mall a try" if the new owner can fill up the place.

Hope springs eternal.

I don't wish the mall owners - new or old - ill. But just so we all know: this is what you get when you have the kind of sprawl we have in this region. Wilmorite, which sucked the life out of downtown by building our suburban malls, built Irondequoit Mall. And then invested heavily in other malls close enough by to suck the life out of its Irondequoit creation.

I know; I know: if Wilmorite hadn't built the malls, somebody else would have. I'm not passing judgment here. I'm just stating facts. In the Community of Monroe, we don't want to engage in rational land-use planning. We just want to keep building new houses and shopping areas and offices - even giving tax breaks to some of the developers - while our population shrinks.

And it's not as if this was a booming area economically, either.

Therefore: when we build new stuff, some old stuff will close. For every winner, there'll be a loser. This time, it just happens to be Medley Centre.

Got it?