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Wichita-area high schools participated in the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network Day of Silence protest last week. This protest is a day in which gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered students and their allies take a vow of silence to demonstrate that discrimination, harassment and bullying silence GLBT students every day. The Wichita chapter of the Kansas Equality Coalition proudly supports this event.

Brent Castillo's column brought attention to this day ("Day of Silence also about redefining?" April 24 Opinion). He wrote: "Any reasonable person would side with the GLSEN in opposing name-calling, bullying and harassment. These behaviors are unacceptable for any reason."

Castillo was correct, and I applaud him for taking the time to discuss the core purpose of the Day of Silence protest. More than a dozen high schools in Kansas have participated.

As Americans, we are proud of the stories of brave protesters who fought for the rights of those who were ignored or treated unfairly. The Kansas Equality Coalition commends any student who participated in the protest and praises school administrators for encouraging this civil and peaceful protest. This protest is more than students standing up for their rights; it is our young people understanding and taking part in the Constitution of the United States of America.

Castillo pointed out unacceptable behaviors that no student should endure. The Kansas Equality Coalition believes that equality for GLBT students, including recognizing insults that target gay students specifically, represents a reasonable request.

Fifty-five years ago, 80 percent of American television viewers, young and old, tuned in to see Milton Berle on Tuesday nights. Tens of millions, rich and poor, worked together at Elks Lodges and Rotary Clubs. Millions more, rural and urban, read general-interest magazines like Look and Life. In those days, the owner of the local bank lived in the same town as the grocery clerk, and their boys might play on the same basketball team. Only 7 percent of adult Americans had a college degree.

But that's all changed. In the decades since, some social divides, mostly involving ethnicity, have narrowed. But others, mostly involving education, have widened. Today there is a mass educated class. The college-educated and noncollege-educated are likely to live in different towns. They have radically different divorce rates and starkly different ways of raising their children. The noncollege-educated not only earn less, they smoke more, grow more obese and die sooner.

Retailers, home builders and TV executives identify and reinforce these lifestyle clusters. There are more niche offerings and fewer common experiences.

The ensuing segmentation has reshaped politics. We're used to the ideological divide between Red and Blue America. This year's election has revealed a deep cultural gap within the Democratic Party.

For example, Barack Obama has won roughly 70 percent of the most-educated counties in the primary states. Hillary Clinton has won 90 percent of the least-educated counties. In state after state, Obama has won a few urban and inner-ring suburban counties. Clinton has won nearly everywhere else.

For weeks, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright was right to castigate those who used sound bites from his fiery sermons to paint him as "some sort of fanatic." But his latest wounds are self-inflicted.

And, as Sen. Barack Obama's recently retired pastor, Wright is taking the Illinois Democrat's presidential campaign down, too.

"I do what I do," Wright said. "He does what politicians do." Wright's right about that. But as some of his own associates have tried in vain to tell him, what he does can help or hurt what Obama is trying to do.

For more than a month, the airwaves have been peppered with video snippets of Wright in the pulpit of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. Wright chose to reveal the real Wright in the public spotlight only days after Obama's Pennsylvania primary loss to Sen. Hillary Clinton. That primary exposed weaknesses in Obama's ability to connect with white working-class voters.

Wright was given a golden opportunity to correct the distorted image portrayed in his sound bites. He could have helped his 20-year congregant's efforts to win votes in Indiana and North Carolina. But he blew it.

The following is an edited text of Gov. Kathleen Sebelius' remarks Wednesday rejecting a coal-plant proposal by legislative leaders:

We are at a critical period for energy policy in this state and this country. We must bridge the gap between our growing energy needs and the time when carbon-capturing technology is a commercial reality. We must move forward strategically -- steering our state clear of the environmental, health and economic risks of massive new carbon emissions.

That is why I am disappointed that, for the third time in a row, the Legislature is asking me to mandate that Kansas send the power we need -- the power we create -- to Colorado and Texas.

It has been made clear, in my recent talks with leaders of both Sunflower Electric Power Corp. and Midwest Energy, that the 200 megawatts designated for Kansas from the proposed Holcomb project are the maximum available energy that Kansas could ever receive. It is all they have set aside for us.

Yet the power needs of western Kansas already exceed 200 megawatts. Therefore, this proposal does not meet our projected energy needs -- and does nothing to address the future needs in the remaining two-thirds of the state.