Imagine the day when higher-speed passenger-train tracks are laid between the current traffic lanes of the interstate highway system. Imagine the day in the future when you decide to take your family on vacation across the country and instead of loading up the car for a multi-day trip or going to the airport, you get on the train at the interstate highway near your home for a fast, energy-efficient, and cost-effective trip that is not connected to Amtrak.

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

Radon gas is the leading cause of lung cancer in nonsmokers, and for persons who have never smoked, chances are much greater of developing lung cancer if exposed to high levels of radon gas over a period of years.

I find it is disgusting when insecure people regurgitate the ancient fables of the Bible as a justification for their bigotry. I would like to address the Rock Island man who, in a letter to the Quad-City Times, was criticizing the print media for not mentioning "Christians" in their coverage of the court rulings regarding gay marriage in Iowa. I would remind him that our Constitution guarantees our freedom from a theocracy (in spite of the Bush administration).