It’s time once again to surrender the soapbox to readers of this column for their annual opportunity to say things naughty and nice about what they’ve read here.

Next week I’ll get to the nice part. Today’s column is devoted to those who took issue with the column or found fault with the columnist.

My column criticizing the state of South Carolina for offering an automobile license plate with a likeness of a cross drew brickbats from the faithful:

“Where do you fools come from? I’m still waiting for one of you clowns to direct me to the place in the Constitution that mentions separation of church and state. It doesn’t exist. … This separation-of-church-and-state lunacy began when some liberal justice, whose name escapes me, put it in one of the court decisions in which he wrote the opinion. … While the Establishment Clause is there to prevent a state religion, it is also there to prevent the state from interfering with one’s freedom to practice his religion, even if that means wearing a cross around his neck or having one on a license plate.”

From another reader: “I have to respectfully disagree with your commentary … My opinion is that if a state allows personalized license plates, they allow freedom of speech on those plates. The only exception I would make would be would be for those that are blatantly vulgar or indecent.”

As most people now know, my tongue-in-cheek column predicting a McCain victory in the presidential election did not vault me into the national spotlight. Many failed to pick up on the unlikely developments I postulated that might send the Republican to the White House: George Bush finding a free-market solution to the economic crisis and giving full credit to McCain; Sarah Palin coming up with a thoughtful plan for national health care; Rush Limbaugh producing a birth certificate showing Barack Obama is a son of Osama bin Laden; McCain promising to make Joe the Plumber his secretary of labor.

One reader wrote: “I think you are full of s—, but if McCain is elected, I hope you are recognized for your caveat-laced prescience, the only good thing that could possibly come out of four more years of George W. Bush via John McCain and his running mate, Lily Tomlin — or whatever her name is. Get down on your knees and pray that if you are wrong you will be forgiven for sullying the escutcheons of all the Known Gods of Common Providence.”

I poked fun at the Russians for the plumbing problems aboard the International Space Station, recalling the shoddy construction, balky toilets and unreliable elevators I encountered during a 1983 tour of the Soviet Union. I contrasted the Russians’ apparent “ineptitude when it comes to simple, everyday necessities” with their prowess in space and in military technology.

Back came a defense of the Russians from a transplanted Northerner in Greensboro, N.C.:

“Ohhhh, Mr. Owens. What a disappointment your column was today. Also, it was so different from the lovely way you write. … I’m sorry your experiences in Siberia (although you speak of all of Russia) were not up to par. I was in Russia last June and loved it! Both St. Petersburg and Moscow were sooooo so beautiful. The loveliness of their cities, their cleanliness, the profuseness of parks and gardens, the beautiful old palaces and cathedrals, but most of all the elegance of their cities and their people. The women wear skirts and high heels to take their children to the park! You see them hurrying after work all over Moscow, much like in Barcelona or Paris. … I don’t know what Greensboro looked like 25 years ago, or how good their toilets were, but whether for better or worse, I’m sure Greensboro of 2008 is different than it was 25 years ago. Come on, Mr. Owens, let’s try for inclusiveness and camaraderie. … The planet is not that big after all.”

One of the saddest columns I wrote was about the father who threw his four small children to their deaths off the Dauphin Island bridge, 80 feet above Mobile Bay. A reader called my attention to a lapse that I attribute to an aging brain:

“I was involved in the search for all of the children, and I live in Mobile and work on the island, so I travel the bridge every day, and I thought I would just let you know that it was four children, not three, like you stated in your article. … You later talked about it being four children when you gave their names, but I just thought I would point this out, just in case someone gets upset about it. Have a great day!”

Another reader contrasted the outrage over this incident with our society’s complacency over the termination of life through abortions:

“I found your column about the deaths of the four children in Alabama very moving and insightful, but with one basic flaw. An underlying reason that we find the violent deaths of children so unremarkable is that, beginning in January 1973, we have deemed it legal, and therefore ‘right’ to remove them violently from the womb before they ever have a chance to live. … If our society accepts the deaths of unborn babies without blinking, why should the deaths of four young children provoke significant outrage? … Your invoking the image of Moloch, the pagan god who consumed children, was very much on point."

Next week, the accolades.

Readers may write gene Owens at 317 Braeburn Drive, Anderson SC 29621, or e-mail him at WadesDixieco@AOL.com