THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
VOL.101.NO.88
THE STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS
(USPS 650-640)
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1992
ADVERTISING:864-4358
NEWS:864-4810
Senate snubs primary
By Greg Farmer
Kansan staff writer
TOPEKA — The on-again, off-again Kansas presidential preference primary is off again in the Senate.
The Senate voted 25-12 yesterday to cancel the April 7 primary.
The House of Representatives and Gov. Joan Finney now will decide the primary's fate. Both must approve the Senate's action for the primary to be canceled.
Lawmakers voted last year to hold a presidential preference primary in Kansas, but no money was appropriated to pay election costs.
Finney allocated $1.5 million to pay for the primary in her proposed fiscal year 1993 budget.
The Senate Ways and Means Committee recommended that the appropriation be approved by the Senate, but State Sen. Lana Oleen, R-Manhattan, proposed yesterday's amendment to deny the appropriation and cancel the primary.
"Kansas voters would not help decide directly who the presidential candidates would be," she said. "They would only be voting for delegates to represent them at the political parties' national conventions.
"The current caucus system provides Kansans with the same opportunity at their county level. The $1.5 million is simply money that could be spent better some where else."
She said the primary would be
Oleen had sponsored a bill earlier this session to cancel the primary, but the bill was killed in the Senate Elections Committee.
"The presidential primary proposal is late, flawed, unnecessary and virtually inconsequential," she said. "We have a responsibility to spend state money on things that matter to Kansans. This is not one of those things."
It is unclear whether the House or the governor will approve Oleen's proposal.
The House never acted last session on a bill passed by the Senate that would have canceled the primary.
Martha Walker, Finney's press secretary, said the governor supported the primary but had not said what the opposition was proposing.
State Sen. Alicia Salisbury, R-Topeka, said the Senate's vote would send a strong message to the House.
"I don't believe people put a higher priority on a presidential primary than they put on other concerns," she said. "We are facing a tight budget year, and the primary is a waste of precious dollars."
But State Sen. William Brady, D-Parsons, said Kansans had expected a primary since the Legislature passed his bill.
"We may not have a legal obligation, but we do
were promised obligation to give Kansans what they
were promised."
State Rep. Betty Jo Charlton, D-Lawrence, said she did not know how the House would vote on the issue.
"I supported the primary and voted for the primary (last session), but when you think about what other things the money could be used for, it makes you pause," she said.
Charlton said the $1.5 million could be used to finance more pressing concerns, such as the first-year financing of Hoch Auditorium.
■ Kansan staff writer Gayle Osterberg contributed information to this story.
Although the State Senate voted 25-12 to cancel the primary, the final decision rests in the hands of the House of Representatives and Gov. Joan Finney.
Kansas primary in question
John Barnes Caney, Kan.
Jeffrey Marsh Fairfield, Iowa
1992 presidential primary candidates
Louis McAlpine Jennings, Okla.
Bob Kerrey
Omaha, Neb.
Stephen Koczak Washington, D.C.
Pat Paulsen Los Angeles, Calif.
Philip Skow Carbondale, Kan.
George Zimmerman Dallas, Texas
David Naster Overland Park, Kan
Jack Beemont Kansas City, Kan.
David Duke
Metairie, La.
Thomas Fabish
Harbor City, Calif.
Tennis Rogers
Sierra Madre, Calif.
Jack Fellure Hurricane, WVa.
Almee Brainard. Daily Kansan
Derek Nolen/KANSAN
Idolgossip
Before the airing of the John Boss talk show on KUJH, David Castellani, Kansas City, Kan., graduate student, Melissa Florek, Evanston, III, senior, Jennifer Hayward, Barrington, III, senior, and Lyla Solomon, Peoria, III, senior, talk with actor Willie Aames. Aames was in Lawrence yesterday to a guest on the show. Aames played characters on the television programs "Eight Is Enough" and "Charles in Charge."
Computer, communications jobs most abundant at center's fair
Despite the recession, two fields look bright for graduating seniors
By Ranjit Arab
Kansan staff writer
Terry Glenm, director of the placement center, said graduating seniors in those two fields accepted the most jobs through the center last year.
Of the students attending the University placement center's job fair today, those studying computer science or communications studies may have the best chance at walking away with a job.
Of the 455 students who registered through the placement center last year, 86 reported that they had accepted jobs, Glenn said. Twenty-one of the students were computer science majors and nine were communications studies majors.
Those two fields are relative bright spots in a year that jobs are scarce and the economy is hurting. The placement center hopes the Internship and Summer Employment Fair, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. today in the Kansas Union Ballroom, will be helpful.
Dave Severance, production manager at Sunflower Cablevision, will represent the company.
Nobleza Asunción-Lande, undergraduate coordinator for the communications studies department, said more businesses were looking for articulate students.
Severance said he would be looking for communications studies students for summer and fall internships. He said he wanted to hire four to six students interested in television production.
"Every job requires communications skills," she said. "Therefore, a communications major is a generalist. That person is able to fit into any organization."
It is possible that a permanent job might be offered to one of the interns, he.
Judy Holloway, administrative assistant for the computer sciences department, said the economy would not affect the demand for computer science majors.
Asuncion-Lande said job opportunities for communication studies majors ranged from disc jockeys to government press secretaries.
"We are in the information age." Asun-
cion-Lande said. "We are getting into the
heart of communication development."
She said the demand for communication studies majors would increase in the future.
Although communications studies and computer sciences majors placed severa-
James Orr, acting head of the biology department, said placement was lower in the sciences because most students go on to medical school or graduate school after graduation.
majors were not as successful.
"I am not saying biology is a poor choice to major in," he said. "But most of our students do not look for jobs right after graduation."
Few students majoring in sciences such as biology and chemistry accepted jobs through the center.
Although the number of students placed through the center might seem low, Glenn said it was misleading. Only 138 of the 455 students registered through the center responded to the center's survey, saying they had received job offers. Therefore, the results were not fully representative of jobs accepted by students in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
"These numbers are based on a few responses," Glenn said. "They do not, in any way, reflect what is happening across the board."
He said the numbers also excluded students who received jobs without assistance from the center.
But the figures also may have been the result of a troubled economy. Genn said.
"We have noticed fewer employers coming to campus to interview students."
Long days with Haitian refugees test professor
ByErik Bauer
By Erik Bauer Kansas staff writer
At a crowded airstrip in Cuba, Bryant Freeman watched as people's lives were decided in a matter of minutes.
The KU professor of African studies and French, who is fluent in Haitian Creole and French, spent winter break helping U.S. Coast Guard and Immigration officials communicate with Haitian refugees seeking temporary asylum in the United States.
He said he also briefed immigration officials on the
backgrounds, marriage patterns and political situations of the refugees.
THOUSANDS of the refugees were interviewed by U.S. officials at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba.
Freeman, who worked seven days a week, 14 hours a day, said the situation at the base was emotionally trying. The interviews, which were supposed to take 20 minutes, determined the
sent back to Haiti, they faced possible imprisonment or execution...
Seventy two percent of the refugees he helped interview had to return to Haiti, he said. About 5 percent chose to return because they became impatient with the interviewers.
"Those of us who work there feel it's wrong to return people to Haiti," said Freeman, who may return to the base at some point. "It was the most intense experience I ever had in my life."
A military coup Sept. 30 that ousted Haiti's first freely elected leader, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, left the island in a state of terror.
the military took control of the entire nation, prompting thousands of Haitians to flee the island on makeshift boats. The refugees who arrived in Cuba were rescued by the U.S. Coast Guard.
Freeman said the Justice Department contacted him for the job in Guantanamo Bay because it had heard of the University's Haitian studies program.
Freeman said many refugees had had to be shipped back to Haiti because they sought economic instead of political asylum. To receive asylum, refugees had to prove that they would be in personal danger if they
Bush lightens U.S. sanctions
The Associated Press
At the same time, the administration moved to block the U.S. assets of Haitians who are providing financial backing to Haiti's coup leaders.
WASHINGTON — The Bush administration announced yesterday an easing of the U.S. embargo against Haiti to help out an estimated 40,000 workers in the assembly sector, almost all of whom have lost their jobs as a result of the sanctions.
State Department representative Margaret Tutwiler said the partial lifting of the embargo could benefit an estimated 240,000 or more Haitians because each of the assembly workers had an average of six to seven dependents.
returned to Haiti.
Many of the refugees, who sought to escape violence, left the country in poorly equipped boats, he said.
"We cannot take in the poor of the world." he said.
Freeman said that a typical story involved a father who would come home to find his family murdered by the military.
"Some of the boats, which weren't more than 100 feet long, had 25% people on them." Freeman said.
Many times, the refugees who survived had spent anywhere from 18 hours to five days on the boats. Usually, they had not eaten due to seasickness.
Only one in two refugees who traveled in such conditions survived, he said.
The lucky ones were rescued by the U.S. Coast Guard, which controls the waters around the island, he said. The Coast Guard then brought the refugees to Guantanamo Bay for interviewing. However, refugees may end up waiting for months before being interviewed.
Freeman said that when refugees first arrived after the military took over, the influx of refugees was so great that the interviews lasted only three minutes a person.
Some were vomiting, some were sick, and their whole lives were determined in three minutes," he said.
Congress votes to extend jobless benefits
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Congress gave bipartisan approval today to its first anti-recession measure this year, an extension of unemployment benefits that President Bush has promised to sign into law.
By a 404.8 margin, the House adopted a $2.7 billion measure that will give another 13 weeks of coverage to people who have used up their jobsbills benefits. The Senate later voted its approval, 94-2.
The new coverage, proposed initially by Democrats but quickly endorsed by Republicans after slight changes were made, will be on top of the 13-week and 20-week extension that became law last fall.
Without the new legislation, 600,000 jobless citizens would use up their benefits later this month. Democrats estimate. In all, 1.2 million U.S. citizens already are receiving extended unemployment coverage, the Labor Department says.
Last year, Bush killed two Democratic efforts to provide extra coverage for people whose 26 weeks of standard benefits were exhausted. But after his approval in public opinion polls dropped, Bush swing in line with the Democrats.
This year, he quickly said he would back a new extension. With the economy still in recession and unemployment high — including in New Hampshire, where he faces his first presidential primary in two weeks - opposition would be politically damaging.
"The president hurt himself badly with his objec tions last year," Rep. Thomas Downey, D-N.Y., a sponsor of the legislation both years, said Monday.
The legislation would be paid for largely by a $2.2 billion surplus the White House said it had discovered. The remaining $500 million would come from forcing large corporations to make larger advance payments of some of their taxes.
Democrats initially proposed financing the measure by having Bush declare a budget emergency, which would allow the government to borrow the money.
The administration objected. The two sides worked out the financing compromise after Democrats decided they had scored their political points last year and had no need to force another confrontation.
The new bill will bring to 26 or 33 the number of weeks of extra coverage people could get, depending on the rate of unemployment in the state where they work.
It also will extend the existing extra benefits program until July 4, instead of expiring June 13 as now scheduled.