/ol. 72 No. 146
2 Pages
Battalion
Tuesday, May 1, 1979 News Dept. 845-2611
College Station, Texas Business Dept. 845-2611
Shooting — guns
and rapids
Texas A&M University will offer
several two-hour, outdoor oriented
PE courses next fall, including
classes in canoeing and shooting
sports. See page 5.
Foreign Ags ask
for no tuition hike
By MERIL EDWARDS
Battalion Staff
Five international students from Texas
A&M University presented a petition
against raising foreign student tuition in
state universities to the House Committee
on Higher Education in Austin Monday.
More than 900 Texas A&M students
signed the petition, which has been cir
culating for several weeks.
Despite the petition, the House Com
mittee passed the bill, which would re
quire foreign students to pay the same
$40-per-semester-hour tuition that out-
of-state students pay. Students from cer
tain countries have only been required to
pay $14 an hour since 1977. Texas resi
dents pay $4 an hour.
Before passing the bill to the House
floor, the Committee added an amend
ment which addressed the issue of foreign
students already here.
One of the students who went to the
Committee hearing, Ahdi Al-Radhi, pres
ident of Texas A&M’s Arab students or
ganization, said the amendment limited
the amount of money for tuition and living
expenses a student can receive based on
his home country.
“The amendment said that not more
than 1.5 percent of the total student
enrollment for a specific institution could
receive financial aid,” Al-Radhi Shid.
“The amendment was highly ambigu
ous, nobody seemed to know or care how
it will work,” Al-Radhi continued.
Nancy Simmang, president of the
International Students Association, said
the Texas A&M students were particularly
upset by the omission of a grandfather
clause, which would protect the students
already enrolled in state universities.
“The students currently enrolled didn’t
know of these hikes when they came,”
Simmang said. “They have invested years
in their education here. So they are faced
with a dilemma: they can’t afford to leave
and they can’t afford to stay. And because
of immigration law, international students
aren’t supposed to work, so where will this
supplementary income come from?”
She said the tuition increase will have a
serious impact on the living standards of
international students.
Al-Radhi said the 11 committee mem
bers did not look at the petitions much,
but just pushed them aside.
“The whole discussion on the amend
ment lasted only three or four minutes,”
Al-Radhi said. “We tried to talk to the
Committee representatives before the
hearing, but could only get their secre
taries.
“When we told one secretary that we
were there to talk about the tuition raise
for foreign students, she said that’s the
way it should be, those internationals col
laborate and cheat. That’s the way they
make the honor roll. ”
Al-Radhi and Simmang said the general
attitude of most of the representatives
they talked with was against foreign stu
dents^
“They seemed to favor the increase,”
Simmang said, “because of the Iranian
student protests. We tried to reason that
Iranians are only a small percentage of
international students, and why should all
others suffer.”
The ISA got little help from the Texas
A&M administration. Simmang and Al-
Radhi said they were told to sit back and
not to protest, to let the bill take its own
way.
The bill is scheduled to come before the
House floor within 10 days. Simmang and
Al-Radhi said their only hope was to find
someone in the House to sponsor a grand
father clause, “but given the present sen
timent, I doubt it,” Al-Radhi said.
Senator calls aide cheat
Stars in his eyes
David Crisp, graduate student in physics, gazes
into the sky with a telescope he built. Crisp made
the telescope with odds and ends he found around
the physics department. The telescope is used to
help astronomy students study the constellations.
Battalion photo by Lynn Blanco
Vo physical reason found
or fiesta sniper’s actions
United Press International
|AN ANTONIO — A medical examiner
pally ruled Monday that a man who
Ined fire on a fiesta crowd, killing two
[sons and injuring 55 others, committed
bide by firing a .38-caliber bullet into
f brain from a pistol found beside the
Py
Medical examiner Dr. Ruben Santos
B he found nothing physical that would
e caused Ira Attebery, 64, to go ber-
k, saying the man’s problems were
chological.
To my knowledge there was no brain
ion or tumor found,” Santos said after
jbducting an autopsy. He said physically
lebery appeared in “great shape.
Attebery parked his motor home at the
ting point of the Battle of Flowers
ade at Broadway and Grayson Streets,
(few open the door and began firing a
tgun and automatic rifle at a group of
en policemen standing at the head of
parade.
And a former Bexar County Jail
ychiatrist said Monday that Attebery
obably just couldn’t tolerate other
people enjoying themselves.”
Psychiatrist Dr. Neville Murray said At
tebery was possibly suffering from feelings
of guilt, and was driven to violence by the
festive atmosphere during the parade.
“Attebery, who presumably had a
deep-seated persecution and guilty com
plex,” said Murray, “evidently was even
more miserable during fiesta merriment,
and he just couldn’t reconcile the good
times with his own misery.”
Police said Attebery, a retired trucker
with a heart condition, was paranoid and
had a dislike for police, fearing that he was
being followed since his involvement in a
1953 Ohio traffic collision in which three
women were killed.
Murray said many persons who commit
acts of violence do so because of fear.
“We really don’t know all the things At
tebery was afraid of, but we are certain he
had the guilt complex about the accident
he was involved in.”
The sniper’s body was transported to a
funeral home at Poplar Bluff, Mo., where
funeral services were to be arranged by
members of his family Monday.
Meanwhile, seven of 30 persons hos
pitalized with gunshot wounds were re
leased from local hospitals over the
weekend. The victims ranged in age from
15 months to 85 years.
Killed on the sidewalk in front of the
camper were Amalia Castillo, 48, mother
of 13 children, and Ida Dollar, 27.
About 80 minutes after Attebery began
firing from an arsenal of six weapons, a
police SWAT team broke into the camper
and found him dead.
United Press International
WASHINGTON — Sen. Herman Tal-
madge, D-Ga., said Monday the Senate
Ethics Committee’s financial misconduct
case against him is based on the word of a
liar, cheat and embezzler and that only a
fool would have done what he is accused
of.
Talmadge’s rich Georgia drawl filled the
mammoth Senate hearing room as the
ethics panel opened its trial-like discipli
nary hearings against him that could
jeopardize his 23-year Senate career.
Talmadge, a lawyer, presented his own
opening statement, quickly beginning the
attack against Daniel Minchew, his former
top aide and now chief accuser.
Minchew has told the committee that he
opened a secret Washington bank account
in Talmadge’s name through which some
$39,000 in false Senate expense claims and
mostly unreported campaign contributions
flowed during 1973-74. Minchew contends
the money went to the benefit of Tal
madge and his family.
But Talmadge said Minchew set up the
account, made deposits and withdrawals
“by forging my signature.”
He said at the time, his net worth ex
ceeded $1.5 million and his annual income
was between $70,000 and $80,000, but
Minchew had financial obligations that ex
ceeded his income by more than $40,000.
“Who was motivated to steal money —
Daniel Minchew or Herman Talmadge?,”
the senator asked.
Talmadge said it was he who initiated an
audit that uncovered discrepancies in his
Senate expense claims — and sub
sequently repaid the Senate $37,125 —
and he was the one who turned over evi
dence of the false expense checks that
ended up in the secret Riggs National
Bank account to the ethics committee and
the Justice Department.
“Even my enemies don’t claim that I’m
stupid,” Talmadge said. “These are steps
that only a fool would take if he were
aware that there was a hidden, phony bank
account waiting to be found.”
“If I had intended to steal the money, I
would not have used an accomplice who
could later implicate me,” Talmadge said,
or left a “paper trail” of the account that
could be easily traced by investigators.
“To find me guilty of complicity in the
Riggs account, you would have to accept
the word of a proven liar, cheat and em
bezzler — accept his word against that of a
senator who held the trust of his col
leagues and his constituents for 23 years, a
senator who would not have jeopardized
his career, betrayed his colleagues and
abused the trust of his beloved state of
Georgia for any reason, let alone a few dol
lars. ”
The senator also said he will disprove
his former wife’s allegations that she took
$10,000 in $100 bills from an old overcoat
in the couple’s Washington apartment in
January 1974.
He characterized three other charges
against him — failure to pay $1,070 in gift
taxes on stock gifts to his former wife, Be
tty, failure to report certain gifts and free
travel he received to the Senate, and dis
crepancies in the amount of campaign ex
penses reported and reimbursements re
ceived — as “minor” and “trivial.”
Try to lift mortgage ceiling
draws charge of collusion
United Press International
AUSTIN —- Texas AFL-CIO President
Harry Hubbard Monday asked Attorney
General Griffin Bell and the Department
of Housing and Urban Development to in
vestigate possible collusion between Texas
utored students may do better
n ‘coach-proof entrance tests
United Press International
WASHINGTON — The National Edu-
ition Association has attempted for
[onths to obtain the material behind an
|released government report that con-
inds students can be coached in prepara-
6n for college entrance examinations.
The Federal Trade Commission has said
is still compiling statistical data on its
port which — according to the NEA —
concludes that students who take costly
crash courses to prepare for supposedly
“coach-proof college entrance tests do
better than students who do not study for
them.
The FTC has yet to Release the report or
discuss its contents. The agency also has
not decided whether to make the report
public or even to approve or reject the
report or modify it.
This has led to an accusation by NEA
House OKs legislation
to push gasohol in Texas
United Press International
AUSTIN — Saying his legislation could
dp ease the nation’s dependence on
reign oil plus put idled acreage to good
se, a Rockdale lawmaker successfully
srsuaded his House colleagues to ap-
ove legislation promoting the fuel mix
illed “gasohol.”
Rep. Dan Kubiak, D-Rockdale, said his
isohol bills would allow farmers to utilize
eir idle acreage to produce crops used in
mixture with gasoline to make fuel for
leir tractors while at the same time,
ssen the United States’ dependence on
iporting foreign oil.
“This provides the fuel for the consumer
iat is desperately needed,” Kubiak said.
“We have 66 million acres of land in this
country that is idle, and if we plant those
acres in fuel crops we could pick up one-
third more protein to feed the hungry
world, and increase our supplies of fuel. ”
After hearing Kubiak’s statements
Monday, the House rewrote a Prohibition
era ban on distilling alcohol in Texas and
approved legislation authorizing the pro
duction of fuel alcohol, which can be made
from grain, potatoes, watermelons, sugar
cane or virtually any other agricultural
crop. When the alcohol is produced, the
byproduct is a high protein food product
which can be used as food for humans or
animals.
Executive Director Terry Herndon the
FTC is watering down its findings.
The NEA said it learned of the report
from “reliable sources” and it seems to
confirm the tests “are less consistent in
their ability to predict potential” than the
testing industry and others have claimed.
The Standard Aptitude Test, or SAT, is
administered by the College Entrance Ex
amination Board which opposes the use of
outside tutors. The board contends a
two-week crash course won’t help the stu
dent do any better on the exam.
But the NEA disagrees.
It contends the crash courses give an
unfair advantage to students who can af
ford them: “People who can afford the cost
of such schools thus have an unfair advan
tage at important transition points — from
high school to college, from college to
graduate, law, or business school, from
school to job, and in some instances from
one job to another.”
The NEA, which represents 1.8 million
teachers, called for a “thorough gov
ernmental and media investigation of the
entire powerful but unchecked testing in
dustry.”
The FTC earlier this month refused a
Freedom of Information Act request by
the NEA to obtain its data on the report.
Spearheading the NEA effort is former
FTC attorney Arthur E. Levine who says
the federal courts may be the next step for
the education group.
lenders and the Federal National Mortg
age Association to force the state Legisla
ture to increase the ceiling on home
mortgage loans.
“We think it’s very obvious there is col
lusion at this particular time,” Hubbard
told a news conference. He said FNMA
President Oakley Hunter had testified
Feb. 12 in support of a bill raising the
Texas ceiling on home mortgage loans
from 10 to 12 percent interest, and said
when the legislation appeared in jeopardy
Hunter announced FNMA would sharply
restrict its purchase of mortgages in Texas,
in effect taking away FHA and VA financ
ing for homes.
“We do not have an eyewitness to collu
sion between the Federal National Mortg
age Association and the Texas Mortgage
Bankers Association, but we have strong
circumstantial evidence, Hubbard said.
“And strong circumstantial evidence has
convinced a lot of juries. ”
Hubbard said Hunter had predicted
housing starts would sharply decline be
cause of Texas’ 10 percent interest ceiling,
but said that has not occurred.
“Therefore, they made it come down by
arbitrarily announcing no mortgage loans
would be made in Texas. And look at the
timing, just a little over a month to go in
the legislative session.
“Would a reasonable and prudent per
son, using plain old common sense, sus
pect they did this by design just to get the
usury ceiling up? I say that is a reasonable
conclusion.
“They say there is no other way to get
this bill out of the Legislature, and we
think under investigation we can find col
lusion between Mr. Hunter and the lend
ing insitutions.”
Hubbard questioned whether FNMA’s
restrictions on the purchase of VA and
FHA mortgages from Texas had been
applied to other states with similar interest
ceilings.
His letter requesting an investigation
was sent to the attorney general and to
Patricia Harris, secretary of Housing and
Urban Development, the agency which
supervizes operations of FNMA.
Battalion photo by Lee Roy Leschper, Jr.
Predator and prey?
Stray dogs like this pup may subsist on pickings from garbage cans and
bags. For a look at the local stray animal problem, see page 3.