We welcome letters, but please include your
full name, address, and daytime telephone number. We edit all
letters for libel, length, and clarity. Send letters to Letters, Illinois Times, P.O.
Box 5256, Springfield, IL 62705; fax 217-753-3958; e-mail
editor@illinoistimes.com. WE DIDN’T STRAY FROM THE RULES As the preschool site manager located at St.
Cabrini School in Springfield, I am writing in response to the
article “A dog’s life” [Bruce Rushton, Feb. 2].
The Head Start site at St. Cabrini has been a licensed Department
of Children and Family Services preschool since December 2002.
According to DCFS licensing, “The child care center shall be
free of stray animals which may cause injury and/or disease to
children . . . . A licensed veterinarian shall certify that dogs
and cats have been inoculated against rabies. This certification
shall be obtained when the animal is acquired (4 months or older)
as required . . . ” This mean that I may not allow stray
animals into the facility. I never have. When a stray animal does
come on the grounds, I ask the teachers to stay inside and call
animal control. None of my staff nor I recall allowing a stray pit
bull or any other stray animal in this facility. Deborah Lahey
Springfield MUSIC CITY SENDS ITS LOVE I didn’t see a way to contact Mary
Rickard but wanted to compliment someone about her great story on
Centralia [“Future shocked,” Nov. 17, 2005]. It is
unfortunate that the community is under such duress right now, but
the writing was excellent and it really reflected the struggles and
the perseverance of the community. I found the article on a Google
search for Centralia, and am happy I did. I’ll check back on IT online in the
future to hopefully see other great articles. Chris Metz Nashville, Tenn. LOOK TO THE HEAVENS FOR TRUTH Somehow with all their focus on creating
alternative explanations for the fossil record below us in the
earth, it appears that creationists and/or intelligent designers
have completely forgotten to look up at the stars! Why do most stars in the sky appear to be
more than 10,000 light-years away? Does that mean that the Earth is
millions, or even billions, of years old, as science suggests? As verified by Einstein through the equation
E=mc2, the energy locked in a piece of matter equals the mass of
the matter times the speed of light squared. The speed of light,
186,000 miles per second, has been verified repeatedly via many
tests. If you truly believe that the earth is only
10,000 years old, and you also accept that the speed of light is a
constant, that means every star and galaxy beyond 10,000
light-years away simply does not exist! Only a tiny part of the
universe surrounding Earth would actually exist if both assumptions
were true. In this case, goodbye Andromeda Galaxy! At over 2
million light years away, you’re just be one of many
pinpoints of light created to fool us. Which leads back to the question: What kind
of God do you choose to believe in? One who creates an
Earth-centered universe and geologic history that supports
literalist interpretations of religious texts? Or a God whose
essence is expressed through the natural processes we see, subject
to miraculous occurrences? Like Pope Benedict and many mainline Christian leaders, I choose the
latter. Tom Clark Springfield NEEDED: HEALTHY DOSE OF REALITY I sometimes wonder what goes through
people’s minds as they go to vote for a certain state
candidate. We hear about morals and values, smaller government, no
new taxes, new programs, and, of course, the touting of the
successes of each candidate. We never get the whole story. I guess
I am looking for reality in state government, and all I see is
ideology and idiocy. The governor is so proud of lowering the
number of state employees. “Do more with less,” we keep
hearing. I wonder if he ever considers what quality of work the
people of Illinois are getting as a result of his policies? Why
hasn’t he come clean with the fact that while front-line
workers have decreased, upper management in these agencies has
increased. How much money is he really saving the state? What about
child protection, prison guards, and other agencies that provide
services to the state? They are understaffed and overworked, and
yet requirements of the jobs they do continue to grow. How does
that serve the citizens of Illinois? And do not get me started on
the budget that is supposed to be balanced. How can the state have
a balanced budget when it can’t pay its own bills on time?
The list goes on. I would love to hear a candidate for state
office be honest for a change and explain how he or she is going to
deal with the fiscal mess that the Legislature and governor have
handed the state. The current governor has broken a
number of promises and has not made the lives of state citizens any
better. There are hard choices that need to be made in order to
address some of these issues, and I truly wonder if there is any
politician that has the guts to do what needs to be done. Party
affiliation be damned. Let’s start with a healthy dose of
reality and work from there . . . not smoke and mirrors. Jerry A. Wood Jr. Springfield REACTOR LEAKS CAUSE FOR ALARM Recent news accounts of radioactive tritium
leaks at Exelon’s Braidwood, Dresden, and now Byron nuclear
reactors finally expose nuclear-industry claims of nuclear power
being “emissions-free” as utter nonsense. While
certainly putting Exelon in hot water, the leak revelations also
expose just how vacuous, inconsistent and ineffective nuclear-power
regulation has become, providing the illusion of public protection
without the substance. Exelon’s incompetence in dealing with
its tritium-leak problems not once but numerous times at several
reactors is matched only by its reluctance to inform the public and local officials of the leaks for
eight years. Now that the cat is way out of the bag at Braidwood,
Exelon “voluntarily” acknowledges the new leak problems at
Dresden (third time) and Byron. Exelon’s excuse for keeping
quiet? “[The] 1998 [Braidwood] pipeline leak wasn’t thought
at the time to contain significant amounts of radioactive
material,” according to an Exelon spokesperson on Jan. 25. Just
what would discharge
pipes designed to release radionuclides for dilution into the
environment contain? Federal regulators haven’t behaved much
better. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission — quick to reassure
us it has “resident inspectors” with watchful eyes
stationed at all operating U.S. reactors — admits Exelon
“informally told” NRC officials about the leaks at the
times they occurred but required no “formal” [i.e.
“written”] notification “because it was assumed no radioactive
substances were released into the environment,” according to
an NRC Region III spokesperson. “Assumed” by whom, and
why? And again, if not radioactive substances, then what? Each new tritium report repeatedly
demonstrates the Stan-and-Ollie nature of the relationship between
Exelon and NRC, each covering for the other, requiring little in
terms of meaningful remediation, and each over the past eight years
keeping the public and their duly elected officials as far away
from acknowledgment of these events as possible. Illinois — the most nuclear-reliant
state in the United States — cannot tolerate the continued
bumbling of “good neighbors” like Exelon, which aspires
to build new reactors and extend operating lifetimes for its 11 old
ones. Nor can it tolerate a regulator with an allergy to assertive
regulation. If reactors can’t be
“emissions-free” as the industry boasts, they should be
closed and not allowed to further pollute the air, water, and land.
If NRC won’t regulate assertively, it should be abolished,
saving ratepayers $700 million-plus per year. David A. Kraft, director Nuclear Energy Information Service Evanston LUCKY GOT A BAD RAP I have known the dog Lucky. That dog is
loving, and I have had my kids around him [Bruce Rushton, “A
dog’s life,” Feb. 2]. I have never seen him bite
anything. Before you go putting out a story, you might want to get
the facts first. That dog is not a bad dog. If the neighbors didn’t target
[Lucky’s owner] George T. Young III, the dog would not have
the reputation of a bad dog. If the neighbors on Louise Lane would
watch TV and not Mr. Young, then Lucky would still be the good dog
that he truly is. Name withheld by request
This article appears in Feb 23 – Mar 1, 2006.
