This new policy of "test optional" admissions is an end run around a recent court decision banning race-based preferences in student admissions, specifically the controversy that surrounded the University of Michigan. (See "Scrubbing Bubbles," River Cities' Reader Issue 659, November 14-20, 2007.) Augustana simply wants to discriminate against whites and males without civil liability and has found a way to do so.

Reverend Jim Richter

Via the Reader Web site

Here's what the Davenport-based rapper Kuz and his manager want you to know:

His single "Boss Status" is presently number seven on Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles Sales chart - one slot ahead of Beyoncé, and one behind J. Holiday - and peaked at number three. The song reached 15 on Hot Singles Sales, and topped out at 80 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop chart. As of Monday, it topped Jamster's hip-hop ringtones chart.

Kuz appeared as himself in the 2007 horror movie April Fools (an I Know What You Did Last Summer knock-off, he said) alongside Emmy nominee Obba Babatundé and hip-hop artist Lil' Flip. "I didn't get killed," he said of his character.

Illinois Governor Rob Blagojevich recently announced $1.5 million in bicycle-path grants for communities in northern Illinois. The City of Rock Island received $200,000 to construct 1.2 miles of trail starting at Ben Williamson Park and ending at 31st Avenue.

Listening to Will Destroy You, Driver of the Year's release from earlier this year, the first thing that popped into my head was Flight of the Conchords, the comedy folk duo from New Zealand that scored an HBO series on which the band's fan base never grew much larger than one.