Many complaints this morning about the Page A-1 story about teen superstar Miley Cyrus' postponing her Saturday night Sprint Center concert till Oct. 17. A sample e-mail:

"Miley Cyrus rates a first page article? What are you nuts? She belongs if anywhere in FYI. Of course Michael Jackson's death rated numerous front page articles while the death of Ted Kennedy a true American hero rated two smaller inside articles."

Now, I have to apologize from the get-go, in that I'm going to play devil's advocate to what I'm hearing -- though I certainly respect the opinions.

A fair point from a reader about the print edition sub-headline to conservative commentator William Safire's obituary, which read, "His eloquence helped make conservatism more respectable." The e-mailer wrote:

The story made no such claim. Moreover, conservatism is respectable with or without William Safire. These are clear examples of the Star's overt and overwhelming bias.

A reader tells me she thinks The Star underplayed its story today about a Kansas City Water Services line break that sent 3 million gallons of raw sewage into the Blue River.

"I'm just puzzled why your editor didn't think this was front-page news," she said. "This is news everyone in the city should have seen on the front page."

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Here's a wholly understandable confusion from a reader, who wrote Sunday:

"The city you referred to in the Sunday short about the Michigan government shut down does not exist. The capital of Michigan is LANSING."

He's referring to this brief in the "Today's Top 5" that day:

2. MICHIGAN GOVERNMENT FACES BUDGET CRISIS

Blogger Fred J. Vannucci, IV of MoonDogSports.com alerted me to an AP story on KansasCity.com about Dallas Cowboy Tony Romo, appearing under the headline "No Jessica, no TO but still INTs for Romo."

Vannucci had posted an item on his blog two days earlier under the headline NO JESSICA, NO T.O., LIFE STILL SUCKS FOR ROMO.

A lot of readers have contacted me tonight because a blog post on the Campus Corner blog from Star staffer Mike DeArmond about the recent spate of fights among KU athletes was removed after a short while online this evening.

"I hope I live long enough to understand your editors' motives for reversing the importance of news articles," wrote a reader today.

"Is it really more newsworthy to be instructed about sneeze etiquette [ front page ] than it is to read that the president has made progress with the agreements on the control of nuclear proliferation? [Page 18 ] That is only the latest example of trivialization of The Star's coverage of the news."

A very fair point from a caller I just got off the phone with:

"I think the word 'groused' in today's story by Dave Helling is a flaw in an otherwise good piece. It is the kind of thing that might lead one to question a reporter's overall disposition towards the speaker."

I don't normally write about the Opinion section unless there's an error of fact, but I think this one's worth discussing.

Reader Advisory Panel member Tom Nelson's "Blog Bit" at the top of the editorial page today writes:

"To those cynics who think Congress doesn’t accomplish anything and avoids making needed decisions, please note that a major legislative event took place last week. Congress took long overdue action and made it legal to carry guns on Amtrak. I have no doubt that ridership will shoot up."

Today, readers are contacting me about something positive instead of negative -- and it's very positive today.

"This is the kind of story you should be putting on the front page every day," said one caller, referring to today's A-1 story about St. Joseph Benton High School’s Matt Ziesel, a football player with Down syndrome.