The winners and the losers

 Winner: Libraries across the Wasatch Front are busting at the seams as the recession forces people away from bookstores and video rental shops. This, of course, is not necessarily good news, especially if you work at one of those establishments. And, just to be clear, there are problems looming down the road. As demands grow on libraries, they will need more tax money, but the tax money won't be there because businesses are in trouble. But it is good for people to become acquainted with the vast stores of knowledge and entertainment — not to mention the many programs — available to them in libraries.

 Loser: It's been a long time since a Utah wilderness bill received much attention in Washington. Now a House subcommittee has agreed to hear one. But the bill is the same one New York Rep. Maurice Hinchey has been pushing for more than a decade, and it has no support among Utah's delegation. Given how contentious the wilderness debate has been through the decades, the first step ought to be getting support from the lawmakers who actually represent the people of the state. Utah's wilderness may belong to all Americans, but the jobs the land here creates belong solely to Utahns.

 Winner: As odd as it sounds, doctors in Miami this week said they had implanted a tooth with a plastic lens into the eye of a blind woman, allowing her to see. The procedure has been used successfully in other nations, and this was the first such operation in the United States. The patient now has 20/70 vision. And yes, the tooth doctors used was an eyetooth.