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See page 8
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Vol 79 No. 172 CJSPS 045360 8 pages
College Station, Texas
Thursday, July 19, 1984
Mondale is Democratic nominee
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United Press International
SAN FRANCISCO — The Demo-
Icratic Party nominated Walter Mon-
Idale as its presidential candidate
I Wednesday and sent the old-line lib-
-eral from Minnesota out to battle
Ronald Reagan for the White
House.
The state-by-state roll call went as
Mondale’s forces had expected and
I cheers exploded as the former vice
president went over the 1,967 total
I needed for nomination when the
vote from New Jersey was cast.
Gary Hart, Mondale’s most per
sistent rival, arrived at the hall be
fore the voting ended and was pre
pared to endorse Mondale before
the session closed.
Initial attempts to gavel the Dem-_
Gunman
shot after
killing 20
United Press International
SAN DIEGO — A crazed gunman
blasting away at random from a Mc
Donald’s restaurant in the worst sin
gle massacre in the nation’s history
Wednesday killed 20 people, slaugh
tering men and women and children
on bicycles before police gunfire
killed him.
“I’ve killed a thousand. I’ll kill a
thousand more,” screamed the bald
ing, 41-year-old assailant as he shot
at patrons and passersby, picking off
infants and adults with a variety of
weapons including a shotgun, a
rapid-fire rifle and a handgun.
His gory siege lasted from 4 p.m.
PDT to 5:25 p.m., when a SWAT
team sharp-shooter firing from the
roof of an adjacent building killed
the man, identified as James Hu-
berty of San Diego.
The shooting ended in the worst
multiple killing by a single gunman
in U.S. history, topping the 1966
shooting of 16 people by a sniper
from atop a tower at the University
of Texas, Austin.
“It looked like something I’ve
never seen before in my life — men
women, little children all shot,” San
Diego Police Chief William Kol-
lender said.
“It was a sickening massacre,” he
said.
One of the dead was a 4-month-
old girl. One of the 13 people in
jured was a 4-year-old girl.
“Even people lying on floor were
moaning,” one unidentified witness
said. “He would go through the
crowd picking them off one by one.”
“There are piles of bodies in
there,” Police Cmdr. Larry Gore
said.”
The scene was a jumble of broken
glass, blood and lifeless bodies. The
McDonald’s windows were riddled
with bullet holes as were several car
windows.
ocratic National Convention to or
der to complete the formality of the
tally proved fruitless. The 6,000 del
egates and alternates packed into the
Moscone Center abandoned their
gray folding chairs and swarmed
over the litter-strewn floor as a huge
blue-and-white Mondale beach balls
careened over their heads.
Mondale’s nomination came on
the eve of the convention’s history
making roll call to pick a woman —
Rep. Geraldine Ferraro of New
York — as its vice presidential stan
dard-bearer in the crusade to drive
the Reagan administration out of
Washington.
Mondale, with his wife, Joan, and
three children at his side, watched
the balloting on television in his 35th
floor hotel suite near the convention
site. The family hugged one another
after Mondale clinched the nomi
nation.
Chanting, squeals of delight and
applause reverberated in a caco-
pnony known only in American poli
tics as the party united after a bitter
and divisive primary season — but
only after the names of Mondale’s
two major rivals, Gary Hart and
Jesse Jackson, were put in nomi
nation for a last hurrah.
Unexpectedly long nominating
speeches and prolonged demonstra
tions, including two sandwiching a
speech by Hart, thwarted Mondale’s
hope of having his first-ballot victory
televised during prime time on the
East Coast.
Mondale, who lived a heartbeat
away from the presidency as Jimmy
Carter’s No. 2 from 1977-1981, is a
56-year-old liberal from the mold of
Huoert Humphrey, steeped in the
party’s New Deal tradition.
Hart, who battled for the nomi
nation with tenacity, did not go
down easily and his operatives
worked the floor until the last min
ute, struggling to collect the votes to
deny Mondale his goal.
Sen. Christopher Dodd of Con
necticut, formally presenting Hart’s
nomination to the convention, said,
“It is not too late to make the right
decision. It is not too late to choose.”
But that was not the will of the con
vention.
Jackson was placed in nomination
by Washington, D.C., Mayor Marion
Barry, who said the civil rights
leader had “changed the course of
American politics.
“The man I nominate tonight has
brought us all together and for that
the nation owes a debt of gratitude,”
Barry said.
Diehard Massachusetts support
ers put the name of former Sen.
George McGovern, the party’s 1972
candidate who dropped out of this
year’s race early in the primary sea
son, in nomination. McGovern with
drew following a brief speech de
nouncing President Reagan’s
foreign policy and calling for an end
to the arms race.
On the convention floor. Hart op
eratives maneuvered right up to the
roll call to shake loose enough dele
gates to deny Mondale a first-ballot
nominaion. But whips in the Mon
dale command post just off the con
vention floor said there was nothing
for their candidate to worry about.
Mondale was nominated by Los
Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, who
was once on the list of possible vice
presidential candidates, with second
ing speeches by Rep. Robert Garcia
of New York and Texas State Trea
surer Ann Richards.
“We want Fritz. We want Fritz,”
Mondale delegates shouted when
Bradley began speaking, waving
blue Mondale signs all across the
hall.
The session had offered a prime
time swan song for Hart who made a
final pitch for his campaign of “new
ideas. The speech apparently did
not shake loose any Mondale dele
gates.
Drop-add begins today
By SUZANNA YBARRA
Reporter
Open drop-add begins today for
Texas A&M students who have reg
istered for the 1984 fall semester
and have their paid fee receipts or
the pink copies of their schedules.
The three-week drop-add period
will end Aug. 17, but drop-add days
based on classification are scheduled
Aug. 21-24. One more open drop-
add is set for Aug. 27-31.
Those wishing to participate in
drop-add between today and Aug.
17 must contact their academic de
partments first to make sure an ad
viser will be available on the day they
plan to be on campus, Associate Reg
istrar Don Carter said.
Students must have their advisers
sign the drop-add slip before turn
ing it in at the Pavilion, Carter said.
Students will receive their drop-
add bills or refunds from the Uni
versity by mail some time after the
12th class day, he said.
Since the paid fee receipt or the
pink copy of the class schedule is re
quired to drop-add, students who
are living here and had their fee
slips mailed to their permanent ad
dresses have three choices before
they can drop-add:
They can wait for someone to mail
the pink copy of their schedule to
them, drive home and pick up the
pink copy, or pay their fees at the
Coke Building and then pick up the
original invoice.
“It has changed tremendously
since last year,” Carter said.
He said this is the first time the
University has allowed students to
drop-add during the summer. It is
also the first time drop-add has been
divided into classifications.
“We had to do something to mon
itor the flow of students into the Pa
vilion,” Carter said.
The drop-add schedule after
Aug. 17 will be:
Tuesday, Aug. 21: Delayed drop-
add for graduate students and se
niors.
Wednesday, Aug. 22: Delayed
drop-add for juniors.
Thursday, Aug. 23: Delayed
drop-add for sophomores.
Friday, Aug. 24: Delayed drop-
add for freshmen.
Mon.-Fri., Aug. 27-31: Open
drop-add for all students.
Sept. 3-11: Drops only for all stu
dents.
Reagan signs tax hike,
spending cut package
The Aggie Seat Photo by Peter Rocha
The Aggie Seat, an invention of three instructors at the fire
man’s training school which is especially useful in rescuing
firefighters from caged ladders, is demonstrated Wednesday
afternoon. See related story page 3.
United Press International
WASHINGTON — President
Reagan, anxious to send a message
of reassurance to Wall Street, signed
a $63 billion package of spending
cuts and tax increases Wednesday in
a step toward bringing huge budget
deficits under control.
Reagan, who praised the bill when
it passed, signed the three-year mea
sure without fanfare. In a one-par
agraph written statement, he called
the measure “important legislation,”
but did not mention the impetus be
hind the bill — the deficit tne White
House estimates at $180 billion in
fiscal 1985.
Rather, he devoted most of his
brief statement to explaining why he
“must vigorously olject” to “the un-
constkutionality” of provisions giv
ing the legislative branch the power
to block federal agencies’ contract
awards.
Under the new law. Congress’
comptroller general is empowered
to review contract awards and order
legal fees and other expenses paid
by the agencies involved to third
parties that successfully contest
them. Reagan said the Justice De
partment will decide how executive
agencies will handle the require
ment.
The compromise agreement in
cludes $50 billion in tax increases
and $13 billion in spending reduc
tions. About half the spending cuts
are in Medicare.
The measure is part of a three-
year, $140 billion deficit reduction
package, half of which is still await
ing action by Congress. Action on
$40 billion in defense spending cut
backs has been stalled by dis
agreement between the House,
which wants to limit growth to 3.5
percent after inflation is taken into
account, and Senate Republicans,
who have stood behind Reagan’s de
mand for 7 percent.
Reagan signed the legislation at a
time when concern about $180 bil
lion-plus deficits has helped drive up
interest rates, a trend his political ad
visers consider worrisome in an elec
tion year.
The bill closes corporate tax loop
holes; increases liquor taxes 20 per
cent; extends for two years, until
Jan. 1, 1988, the 3 percent tax on
long distance telephone calls; forces
Medicare recipients to pay more for
doctor visits and freezes fees doctors
collect from the government for
treating Medicare patients.
The tax changes do not tamper
with the personal tax cuts Reagan
pushed through Congress early in
nis presidency. He threatened to
veto any deficit-reduction measure
that repealed the tax cuts or blunted
their impact.
Even with the reductions pro
vided, the government will remain
awash in red ink for the foreseeable
future.
Prairie View A&M: Students express concern
vil
By REBECA
ZIMMERMANN
Editor
(Editor’s note: This is the second
of a three-part series on Prairie View
A&M University.)
While Texas A&M System admin
istrators view the future of Prairie
View A&M University with confi
dence and anticipation, students at
Prairie View A&M are concerned
with the present.
Students agree conditions at the
university are improving and will
improve even more, but meanwhile
there are problems: facilities, aca
demics ana the quality of student
life.
Kevin Dennis, the student body
president of Prairie View A&M, calls
recent and planned improvements
at the university “the Renaissance of
Prairie View.” But in the renais
sance, some landmarks — or at least
student haunts — are disappearing.
“A lot of the traditions here are
kind of muddled because of the
transitions,” Dennis says.
Two student hangouts have fallen
for improvements — a main drag
called ‘the cuts’ and the Senior Gar
den, a rose garden only for seniors.
Dennis says students see the im
provements as a positive change, but
the loss of traditional hangouts was
emotional.
“It was like a funeral,” Dennis says
about the conversion of the main
drag, a social area near the women’s
dorms, into a mall area. “People sat
there and watched the bulldozers
run up the cuts. That whole area
used to be like a Mardi Gras.”
The destruction of the main drag
was disturbing, says Glenn Mackey, a
senior engineering technology ma
jor from Chicago, out the area was a
safety hazard.
The destruction of landmarks
isn’t widespread — it’s all part of a
master plan to upgrade facilities and
beautify the campus, a long overdue
process.
Three years ago, when Dr. Terry
Anderson participated in the faculty
exchange program between Texas
A&M and Prairie View A&M, he was
shocked by conditions at Prairie
View A&M.
“The situation was like primitive
camping,” says Anderson, an assis
tant professor of history at Texas
A&M. The grass wasn’t mowed, a
garbage dump was in plain view and
the stadium was condemned.
“Can you imagine what would
happen if Kyle Field was condem
ned?” he says.
The primitive conditions included
classrooms without air conditioning.
“My students sweated on their
notes,” Anderson says.
Classrooms in older buildings,
which don’t have central air condi-
See PRAIRIE, page 4
In Today’s Battalion
Local
• The Battalion reviews “The Last Starfighter,” a newly
released movie. See story page 5.
State
• President Ronald Reagan plans to campaign in Austin
next week. See story page 8.
National
• Texas Agriculture Commissioner Jim Hightower blasts
Reagan in speech at Democratic convention. See story page
3.