CSS works in Chrome but not IE/Firefox

delete background-color: inherit; from your links from lines #17 and #18 in your pastebin

add color: #ffffff (or whatever font color you want paragraphs in sidebar to have) in #extras (line #31 in pastebin)

@johnomcg – what do you mean “what to do about the links on the left and right sidebars” change the color to white for example? then find #extras a and ul.page li a:hover etc in your theme’s style.css and change blocks to:

#extras a, #extras a:hover { color: #ffffff; }
ul.page li a:hover, ul.page li.current_page_item a { background-color:#861710; color: #ffffff; }