Our primary interest has been that we have reliable and valid measures of learning comparable in rigor. This legislation accomplishes that.

such an egregious piece of special-interest legislation, it is almost shameless.

The legislation includes raising interest rates on student loans to 6.8 percent, as opposed to 4.7 percent, and it could raise as high as 8.5 percent.

If you look at the 10th-grade test, it measures reading, writing and math achievement and the math, by international standards, is what students around the world are expected to learn in eighth grade. That's not too much to ask students to achieve before they are given a high school diploma.

We believe the state of Mississippi's dependence on the gaming industry will be an important factor in passage of legislation that is more protective of these two valuable sources of economic vitality.

If legislation doesn't protect habitat, how then can the government pretend that it will protect the species themselves?