This week the Tribune-Herald editorial board pondered the wisdom of elected leaders in Washington as they continued to imperil this nation through political gridlock in the debt-limit crisis.

* Sunday we endorsed the debt plan from the so-called Gang of Six as a foundation for talks. Sadly, anything this significant now seems lost in all the political sparring and grandstanding of the past week.

* Monday we acknowledged the contributions of local philanthropists Jim and Nell Hawkins, most recently in donating $3.5 million toward the construction of a $7 million indoor tennis center at Baylor University.

* Tuesday we urged county commissioners to address constituent concerns by covering the expense of an unexpectedly large number of abandoned or lost dogs and cats brought to the Humane Society of Central Texas from our county’s rural stretches.

* Wednesday we congratulated National Football League owners and players’ representatives for hammering out a compromise after a 136-day work stoppage. Maybe we should send NFL negotiators to Washington to help resolve matters there.

* Thursday we turned over the page to our readers to sound off on the debt crisis. We included a poem about the crisis by the Bard of Woodway, Ben Hagins. Our readers never fail to astonish us.

* Friday we agreed police and firefighters in Hewitt suffer from inadequate quarters. We back city council plans to hold a bond election for a new facility to ensure that the public has the chance to say yea or nay.

* Our Quote of the Week comes from County Commissioner Lester Gibson regarding the decision by commissioners to spend up to $58,000 to reverse their vote from May and go back to a 24-week pay schedule to accommodate employees: “It would have been a problematic situation that our employees don’t need to endeavor at this time.”

* Our Letter of the Week comes from Sandy Barron, writing on the $475,000 that county commissioners spent for a software system to go to a 26-week pay schedule and the $58,000 approved to return to a 24-week schedule after employees objected: “I went from weekly to monthly paychecks. The first month of adjustment, it was hard. But I got over it. Don’t forget you get paid sooner and more often on a 26-week pay schedule. I wonder how many potholes $475,000 would fill?”