The Battalion
Vol. 71 No. 74
6 Pages
Wednesday, January 4, 1978
College Station, Texas
Inside Today:
Golden oldies not forgotten, p. 2.
Carter gives up crown, p. 3.
SWC gridiron reviewed, p. 5.
News Dept. 845-2611
Business Dept. 845-2611
J
arter detours
o mend peace
United Press International
YADH, Saudi Arabia-President Carter
to Egypt today in a crucial detour of his
tour to try to pat ch up differences with
iident Anwar Sadat on the Palestinian
e.
larterflew to Aswan, Egypt from talks in
fi Arabia, (Egypt’s backer and bankrol-
the Middle East), in which the presi-
brought King Khaled closer to the
position of a Palestinian homeland
ed to Jordan.
he president, taking time out on his
to Paris and the fifth scheduled stop on
world tour, left Saudi Arabia early to
emore time with Sadat,
gptian officials said Sadat will urge
terto recognize the right of Palestinians
ielf-determination, thus opening the
for the possible establishment of a
stinian state on the West Bank of Jor-
and Gaza Strip.
he Palestinian issue is the main stumbl-
block to a Middle East peace settle-
it. The difference is whether the Pales-
ms should have simple self-autonomy,
Israel has proposed, or full self-
jrmination, as Egypt has insisted,
tthe Christmas day summit between
aland Israeli Prime Minister Menahem
in Ismailia, Egypt, Israel offered
■autonomy for Palestinians in the West
hand Gaza Strip. Sadat, however, in-
adon self-determination for the Pales-
insinart independent state in the same
occupied areas.
In the past, Carter has called for a Pales
tinian homeland as part of a Middle East
settlement. However, on the eve of his
departure, Carter said he supported the
Israel proposals and said publicly he did not
agree to creation of an independent Pales
tinian state.
Sadat said Carter’s remarks “surprised...
embarrassed...disappointed” him.
Carter’s stop in Aswan was aimed at heal
ing the rift with Sadat and reporting on his
talks in Tehran, Iran with Jordan’s King
Hussein and with the Saudis.
The Egyptians hope they can persuade
Carter to put pressure on the Israelis to
make more concessions on the issue.
“The United States can bridge the gap
between the various viewpoints,” Foreign
Minister Ibrahim Kamel said. “Egypt
wants the United States to play a positive
role, particularly in regard to acknowledg
ment of the right of Palestinians to self-
determination.’
The visit to Riyadh, Carter’s fourth stop
on a seven-nation trip that ends Friday,
began on the hopeful report that the Saudis
may be shifting their views on the Palesti
nian question.
“It would appear that they are now mov
ing to our approach to the Palestinian is-
,sue,” a U.S. official traveling with Carter,
said - a major switch, since the moderate
Saudis have strongly backed a separate
homeland for Palestinian refugees.
irmed miners
wade Tennessee
United 1’iess Interiintionnl
ime 600 striking United Mine Work-
anned with ax handles, hunting knives
guns, invaded eastern Tennessee
day, vowing to block post-holiday re
gion of production at non-union soft
mines. Others burned equipment in
ana, and two strikers were hit by a car
Pennsylvania picket line,
iners entering Tennessee from
hboring states traveled in a caravan of
it 200 cars, heavily outnumbering area
nforcement officers. Two UMW strik-
I'ere run down in Pennsylvania when a
b superintendent tried to drive his car
ugh a picket line blocking a mine
ance.
le two pickets were treated for minor
ties and a warrant was issued for the
st of the superintendent.
[Washington, negotiations to settle the
week strike by 188,000 UMW miners
ained recessed with no date set for re-
ption of talks. Each side blamed the
r for the collapse of negotiations,
aderson County, Term., Sheriff Den
nis Trotter said the out-of-state pickets
moved in convoys around the New River
and Windrock areas of eastern Tennessee.
Most mines in eastern Tennessee either
are non-union or have miners affiliated
with the Southern Labor Union. They have
been shut down for about three weeks by
roving pickets who moved into the area
before the holidays.
In Indiana, a caravan of about 75 cars
swooped down Tuesday on two non-union
mines in the southern part of the state.
Windows were broken and a bulldozer set
afire at the Heritage Hills mine near Hol
land, Ind., and three pieces of equipment
were set ablaze at another mine near Santa
Claus, Ind.
Somerset County, Pa., Sheriff Donald
May said a warrant was issued for mine
superintendent Ronald Corl following the
picket line incident at a Lunar Mining Co.
mine in Quemahoning Township. May said
one of his deputies also was hit by the
superintendent’s car but did not require
treatment.
Battalion photo by Pat O’Malley
Giving it his all
Freshman quarterback Mike Mosley’s 180 yards on Dec. 31 did little
to help the Aggies attain a victory in the Bluebonnet Bowl. The
Trojans of the University of Southern California outscored the
Aggies 47-28. See related story, page 5.
Drought continues
despite rain, snow
United Press International
SAN FRANCISCO-It’s raining. It’s
snowing. So the great California drought is
over. Right?
Wrong.
Despite a rash of December storms and
predictions of more early in the new year.
Gigged
USC runningback Charles White gives Texas A&M
defensive back Mike Williams the thumbs-down on
the way to helping the Trojans to a 47-28 victory in
the Bluebonnet Bowl Saturday. See related story,
page 5.
Battalion photo by Pat O’Malley
drought officials say that, at best, they are
just the beginning of the end.
To the 5 million Northern Californians
still under water rationing, Bill Clark of the
State Drought Information Center said
Tuesday:
“It will be at least three years before we
can say we have turned the drought
around.”
That means the drought, already in its
third year, will make more permanent new
life styles imposed on residents, such as:
Shorter showers, less flushing of toilets
and decreased use of dishwashers, which
are big water consumers that use nearly a
whole day’s allotment for some persons on
rationing.
An irony of the drought is that residents,
who have cooperated remarkably in the ra
tioning, are paying more for being good
citizens. By using less water, they cut down
incomes of water companies, which com
plete a vicious circle by raising water rates
to the good Samaritan consumers. Water
bills of $100 for households are not un
common.
The key word to the drought is “ground-
water.” It’s the water that seeps into un
derground storage from rainfall and runoff
from the Sierra snowpack. And it accounts
for 40 percent of the water supply.
The other 60 percent comes from reser
voirs, which have filled up to nearly half of
normal but can’t signal the end of the
drought even when full.
“Were taking more water out of our un
derground resources than is going in,” said
Richard Poison of the Fresno Farm Bureau
in the San Joaquin Valley, the heart of the
nation’s fruit and vegetable production.
“We re about 1 1/2-million-acre-feet
short of the normal underground table. It’s
going to take several years of normal or
excessive rain to build it back up.”
An acre foot is one acre of water a foot
deep.
He added that shoppers across the nation
can expect continued higher prices because
of farm losses estimated at $700 million as a
result of the drought.
As the producers of 25 percent of Ameri
ca’s food, California farmers use about 85
percent of the state’s water.
January and February - the top rainfall
months of the year - look promising, says
the National Weather Service. And those
months are the immediate key.
“But we can’t actually count our luck
until spring when the snowpack melts and
runs into storage and we know how much
we’ve got,” said Clark.
In cold figures, what California needs is
about 130 percent of normal rainfall this
season followed by two years of normal pre
cipitation, he said.
Russia blames
China for war
United Press International
HONG KONG — The Soviet Union is
blaming China for provoking the border
war between Vietnam and Cambodia
which has killed thousands on both sides.
A Radio Moscow report monitored in
Hong Kong Tuesday said, “The worsening
relations between the Socialist Republic of
Vietnam and Kampuchea, Cambodia has
obviously been provoked by Peking.”
It was the first time the Soviets openly
have blamed their Communist rival by
name, although Moscow previously has
hinted that Chinese advisers were help
ing Cambodia.
Vietnam has received most of its war ma
terial support from Moscow; Cambodia
leans toward Peking.
Reports from Cambodia and Vietnam in
dicate division-size operations involving
thousands of troops, armor, artillery and air
power are involved in the fighting in Cam
bodia’s Svay Reng province, known as the
Parrot’s Beak to U.S. soldiers who fought
there during the Vietnam war.
Refugees from the area have said the
fighting has caused more than 2,500 casual
ties on both sides.
The Cambodians, historic enemies of the
Vietnamese, have accused Hanoi of trying
to take over Cambodia and force it to join a
Vietnam-domintaed “Indochinese Federa
tion.”
The Soviet commentary said, “The
Chinese authorities cannot reconcile them
selves with the existence of United Socialist
Vietnam..."
Cambodian President Khieu Samphan
has charged “some foreign nationals have
acted as advisers, company commanders
and experts in artillery units and armored
units’’ in internal fighting by anti
government guerrillas.
Samphan aid not identify the foreign
ers,” but U.S. officials said it was clear he
was referring to Soviet military advisers.
The New China News Agency said from
Peking the Soviets are helping the
Vietnamese.
U.S. officials say they have no indepen
dent confirmation of the Soviet and
Chinese involvement in the actual fighting,
but there is ample evidence China is sup
porting Cambodia and the Soviet Union
has lined up with Vietnam.
The Cambodian government has also
said the immediate reason for the fighting is
Vietnam’s food shortage, which has caused
the Hanoi government to “rob and pillage”
thousands of acres of rice.
Vietnamese forces invading Cambodia
were accompanied by several rice
harvesting machines, the Cambodian
broadcast said.
Attorney claims
new evidence in
quest for appeal
United Press International
HOUSTON-The attorney for the family
of the late Dr. John Hill says new evidence
gathered by police and the district attor
ney’s office is enought to warrant a new trial
on a wrongful death suit against millionaire
oilman Ash Robinson.
Robinson was exonerated by a jury in
state District Judge Arthur Lesher’s court
Oct. 21 in a $7.6 million wrongful death suit
filed by Hill’s survivors. The suit claimed
Robinson had Hill killed to avenge the mys
terious death of Joan Robinson Hill, the
doctor’s first wife and the oilman’s only
child.
Lesher said Tuesday attorneys in the
case had to submit written arguments be
fore he would decide whether to grant a
new trial.
Hill was shot to death Sept. 24, 1972, in
the foyer of his colonial mansion. At the
time, he was awaiting trial on murder-by
neglect charges in the 1969 death of Joan
Robinson Hill from a mysterious infection.
Ray Bass, attorney for the Hill family,
Tuesday told Lesher a North Carolina con
vict was present in 1972 when a murder
contract on Hill’s life was offered.
In arguing his motion for a new trial, Bass
said Houston police and the district attor
ney’s office had obtained statements from
convict William H. Martin Jr. at the peak of
their murder investigation.
The record of the criminal investigation
was never made part of the civil trial be
cause the district attorney’s office consid
ered the five-year-old murder case an open
investigation.
Bob Bennett, a former assistant district
attorney who sought Martin’s testimony in
murder trials against two other principals
in the Hill case, said the inmate refused to
come forward voluntarily but there was
some knowledge among lawyers of the
interview in April 1973.
“He (Martin) said money was available to
kill a doctor in Houston and the money was
available from the doctor’s father-in-law,”
Bennett said.
Only one other witness, Marcia McKit-
trick, who drove the getaway car at the time
of the killing, has voluntarily linked Robin
son to the murder conspiracy.
Bass argued there was grounds for a new
trial because there was a witness who had
knowledge of a crime but refused to testify.
Cambodia has also been involved in bor
der clashes with Thailand and Laos, though
reports from Bangkok Tuesday said that
border was quiet.
Privileges
unfair, say
prisoners
SPRINGFIELD, Mo.-Prisoners con
tend Christmas furloughs given former
Nixon administration officials show that the
Federal Bureau of Prisons provides unfair
privileges to the “mighty and rich.”
The prisoners were angered by a medical
furlough granted former Attorney General
John Mitchell and Christmas furloughs
given H.R. Haldeman and John Er-
lichman, former President Richard Nixon’s
two top aides.
In a letter to Attorney General Griffin
Bell, a group of inmates at the Medical
Center for Federal Prisoners said the fur
loughs went against the policy of the Fed
eral Bureau of Prisons.
The group, the Committee for Prisoners
Equal Rights, said they do not oppose the
furloughs but simply want to point out that
the privilege is not afforded other prison
ers.
“Obviously, this is unequal justice and
unequal treatment, and this is the reason
for a great deal of bitterness here. The men
fully realize that in this country there are
two kinds of justice, one for the mighty and
rich and another for the ordinary and
poor,” the letter said.
Among those signing the letter was Nick
Civella, reputed crime boss of Kansas City,
who is serving 36 months for interstate and
foreign travel and transportation in aid of
racketeering.
/ V
Local farmers
rally, more
support sought
Farmers are expected to rally in
Bryan today to seek public support
for the conitnuing nationwide farm
strike.
The gathering at Townshire Shop
ping Center is in protest of low re
turns for crop production.
More than 100 tractors and other
vehicles have been anticipated for
the local demonstration.
Meanwhile, the leader of the
South Texas farm strike effort Tues
day said a concerted effort is begin
ning this week to recruit cotton and
grain growers in the Coastal Bend
and Rio Grande Valley for the
American Agriculture movement.
George Kowalik, a local imple
ment dealer who led a large caravan
of tractors to the federal building in
San Antonio last month, said meet
ings were scheduled this week at
Karnes City, Robstown, Odem, Sin-
ton, Taft and Mathis to encourage
the farmers to join the movement.
The first Lower Rio Grande Valley
meeting will be next Monday at
Mercedes, Kowalik said, and Ameri
can Agriculture members from Kan
sas, Idaho, Nebraska and other states
might come to South Texas next
week to help with the organizing.
Kowalik added the strikers were
inviting Gov. Dolph Briscoe and
Rep. Henry B. Gonzalez, D-Texas,
to a barbecue Saturday in Pearsall,
and that two South Texans would be
among a group of 10 Texans attend
ing a meeting with Agriculture Sec
retary Bob Bergland Saturday in
Omaha, Neb.
Kowalik said vegetable farmers in
the Winter Garden Area (Crystal
City-Carrizo Springs) and in the
Lower Valley so far had ignored the
strike effort, which primarily has
been centered in Frio County, 60
miles southwest of San Antonio,
where farmers have threatened to
park their tractors until they get 100
percent parity for their crops.
Kowalik quoted from a Dec. 15
Texas A&M University report on
projected costs of production of
crops in Texas this year.
He said the report projected it
would cost $4.47 to produce a
hundred pounds of milo, $3.82 a
bushel for wheat, $3.01 a bushel for
com, 44.5 cents a pound for cotton
and 19 cents a pound for peanuts.
Kowalik said market prices for those
crops last year were $3.20 for milo,
$2.25 for wheat, $2 for corn, 38 to 44
cents for West Texas cotton and 21
cents a pound for peanuts.
“There’s no way anybody could
break even,” he said.
V - !