iol. 83 No. 8 CJSPS 045360 16 pages
« Texas m m V •
The Battalion
College Station, Texas
Friday, September 11,1987
.S. to ask Congress
to send Contras aid
■WASHINGTON (AP) — Secre-
tavy of State George P. Shultz, argu
ing that the alternative is a “commu
nist victory” in Nicaragua, said
Thursday the administration will ask
Congress for $270 million in aid to
the Contra rebels for an 18-month
period.
Testifying before the Senate For
eign Relations Committee, Shultz
said additional aid to the Contras is
the best insurance that Nicaragua
Poindexter testifies
confession about Iran
produced sympathy
■WASHINGTON (AP) — After
National Security Adviser John M.
Poindexter confessed to President
Reagan last Nov. 25 of his involve
ment in the most damaging incident
in Reagan’s political career, there
(frag no scolding or reprimand, just
sympathy from the president and
those around him. ^
^■\ccording to documents and '
transcripts released Thursday by the
congressional Iran-Contra commit
tees, Poindexter said he was merely
told by the president and his men
they were sorry he had to resign.
Hpn private testimony taken in four
separate sessions last May, June and
Ju|y in preparation for Poindexter’s
televised testimony in mid-July, the
Navy rear admiral also said he was
never particularly bothered by the
idea of swapping arms to Iran for
Americans held hostage in Lebanon.
^■Although Reagan has said repeat-
edlv he never intended to approve
such a swap, Poindexter told the
committees: “I frankly don’t find
thiu distasteful.”
H“I think that we live in a very im
perfect world, a very dangerous
world, and sometimes you don’t
have the best options or the ideal op
tion and you’ve got to do what’s nec
essary,” Poindexter said.
■Two months before he testified in
public, Poindexter was telling the
congressional investigators he had
deliberately decided not to inform
the president that he had adopted a
proposal made by Lt. Col. Oliver L.
North to divert money from the
arms sales to Iran and use it to bene
fit the Contra rebels in Nicaragua.
He said he kept the president
uninformed because the plan was
obviously controversial and “would
cause a ruckus if it were exposed.”
But when the diversion was ex
posed and the decision had been
made to accept his resignation, Poin
dexter said there was little recrim
ination aimed at him.
He said he told Donald Regan,
then the White House chief of staff,
that he had “general knowledge” of
the diversion and was going to re-
sign.
Later that day, he repeated his in
tention to the president and other
advisers in the Oval Office.
Poindexter was asked: “Did any
one say to you . . . ‘why did you do
such a stupid thing as letting this
happen?’ ”
After his lawyer objected and the
question was rephrased, Poindexter
replied: “That sort of expression was
never made.”
Q. “Did they scold you in any
way?”
A. “None whatsoever.”
Q. “There was no sense of repri
mand?”
A. “None?’
Q. “Did they express sympathy
for your situation?”
A. “Yes, they did.”
Poindexter said that he decided to
authorize the diversion of arms-sale
money to the Contras within min
utes after North proposed it.
He said he simultaneously de
cided not to tell Reagan.
will comply with the terms of the
Central American peace agreement
it signed last month in Guatemala.
The announcement drew imme
diate criticism from a number of
congressional Democrats and is cer
tain to produce another round of
heated debate on Capitol Hill over
the administration’s Central Amer
ica policy.
Shultz said, “If the Guatemalan
agreement is to be implemented in a
way that secures a negotiated cease
fire, a democratic opening in Nicara
gua, and accommodation of basic
national security interests . . . the
United States must continue to furn
ish their support to the freedom
fighters.”
White House spokesman Marlin
Fitzwater told reporters the aid re
quest will “keep pressure on the
Sandinistas as we go through the
peace process and let them know the
president is serious in his commit
ment not to desert the resistance.”
The Guatemala agreement,
among other steps, calls on the
Sandinista government to arrange a
cease-fire and to implement demo
cratic reform measures by Nov. 7.
These measures would occur
about five weeks after the current
Contra aid allotment expires.
It also calls on the United States to
cease funding the Contras.
House Speaker Jim Wright, D-
Texas, who has played an increas
ingly influential role in the Central
America issue, said it was inappro
priate for the administration to
make a request for more Contra
money while the peace process was
under way.
“Such a request would anticipate
the failure of the peace process,” he
said. “I don’t anticipate the failure of
the peace process.”
“ I anticipate success.”
Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn.,
an outspoken critic of the adminis
tration policy in Central America,
told Shultz during Thursday’s hear
ing that a Contra aid request at this
time “is the worst possible signal you
could send.”
Dodd said the administration may
be embarked on a “significant, pro
found, historical mistake.”
Antonio Torar was injured Thursday at 4:06 p.m.
when his motorcycle struck a car pulling onto
Bizzell Street, said Bob Wiatt, campus director of
security and traffic. The driver’s view apparently
was blocked by a bus, he said. The motorcycle
Photo by Perry A. Liston II
then bounced into a parked car, sending Torar
over its hood. He was taken to St. Joseph Hospital
and released after treatment of facial cuts. The
car’s driver, a female A&M student, was charged
with failure to yield the right of way, Wiatt said.
■Winds damage pope’s altar, topple twin towers
I SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Lashing winds
damaged the altar Thursday night that was
built for Pope John Paul IPs upcoming ap
pearance, toppling twin 12-story metal tow
ers minutes after workers scrambled to
safety, authorities said.
■ No injuries were reported after the wind
storm swept through south and central
Texas and crumpled the 150-foot towers
just after 6 p.m. CDT, Bexar County Sher
iff Harlon Copeland said.
Workers fled from the area when a vol
unteer firefighter who heard radio reports
of the fast-approaching storm warned them
with his bullhorn, Copeland said. Minutes
later, the towers came crashing down in
winds estimated at between 70 and 80 mph.
The altar platform itself is about 90 per
cent salvageable, and workers were to labor
throughout the night to repair the damage
so the Mass can go on as scheduled Sunday,
archdiocese spokesman Richard Hem-
berger said.
“The towers, however, will not go back
up,” he said. “Everything else will be on
schedule. The helium-filled cloud (that was
to hover over the pope during the Mass)
was damaged also and will not be used.”
“This was just one of those freak winds
that came out of nowhere,” Hemberger
said.
The towers were scattered near the stage,
as were pieces of about a dozen of the 16
smaller towers representing each of Texas’
dioceses.
Copeland blamed the collapse in part on
corrugated plastic shields used as part of
the stage’s backdrop and said it isn’t clear if
the damage can be repaired in time for
Sunday’s Mass.
“The corrugated plastic shields and fi
berglass started blowing and this is because
of the wind,” he said. “T hey acted like a sail,
and it just blew them (the towers) over.”
Workers had labored throughout the af
ternoon to put up banners, scaffolding and
other finishing touches on the outdoor site
two miles outside the city limits.
icientists call new test
: or AIDS virus superior
o existing virus check
WASHINGTON (AP) — Re
searchers said Thursday they
have developed an AIDS diag
nostic test that readily can be tai
lored to detect new strains of the
■lisease virus and is easier,
■cheaper and more accurate than
; Existing tests.
I Scientists at the Research Insti
tute of Scripps Clinic in La Jolla,
See related story, Page 3
Calif., and the federal Centers for
Disease Control in Atlanta said
that the test appears to be supe
rior to the so-called Western Blot
test widely used to confirm infec-
f|ion by the AIDS virus.
I Health authorities typically
Jfcreen blood and test people for
AIDS infections using what is
“tailed an ELISA test, which de
flects antibodies developed against
proteins coating human immuno
deficiency virus or HIV.
Because current ELISA tests
tan give false positive readings —
sometimes indicating an infection
tvhen none is present — scientists
werify positive findings with the
JpVestern Blot, a more time-con-
■ Turning and difficult-to-perform
T^st to detect core proteins of the
drus.
In a report to be published Fri
day in the journal Science, scien
tists say they have developed a
very specific type of ELISA test
that does not produce the false
positives or false negatives some
times seen in the other two tests.
In addition, they say, the new
test can be modified easily to de
tect other strains of the HIV vi
rus. This means that if new dis
ease-causing strains of HIV are
discovered, tests for them can be
produced quickly, they added.
“The test is pretty much 100
percent in detecting different
strains of HIV,” Dr. Jay A. Nel
son of Scripps said in a telephone
interview.
The test was developed by Drs.
John W. Gnann Jr., Michael B.A.
Oldstone and Nelson at Scripps
and Drs. Joseph B. McCormick
and Sheila Mitchell of the CDC.
Nelson said researchers at the
CDC, as well as at some AIDS re
search centers in the United
States and Africa, are running
comparisons between the new as
say and the Western Blot. These
results must be submitted to the
Food and Drug Administration'
and accepted by the agency be
fore the new test can be approved
for general use, he said.
Number of psychology majors grows
to greatest in College of Liberal Arts
PSYCHOLOGY UNDERGRADUATE MAJORS AT TEXAS A&M
1200+ Expected
1200 -
1100-
1000 -
900 -
700 -
600-
500-
400-
'82-83 '83-84 '84-85 ’SB-'Se 'SB-'S? '87-88
ACADEMIC YEAR
By Cindy Milton
Staff Writer
Texas A&M’s growth and a more
business-oriented society has caused
the number of psychology majors to
skyrocket, says Dr. Stephen Wor-
chel, head of the psychology depart
ment.
“We’re the largest major in the
College of Liberal Arts by far,” Wor-
chel says. The psychology depart
ment alone has almost 1,200 stu
dents and it continues to grow.
Worchel’s efforts to increase the de
partment have been effective — the
number of undergraduates has in
creased by almost 821 students since
his arrival.
“When I came to A&M, the de
partment was really small and it
looked like a challenge,” Worchel
says. “It didn’t have much of an
identity then and I thought it would
be interesting to see the department
develop.”
Worchel feels the department
now is “one of the better-kept secrets
in the country.” He commended the
faculty of the department, which has
increased by 11 members this year,
and includes several winners of na
tional teaching awards.
Worchel attributes the increase in
psychology majors to a more busi
ness and human-related society.
“The department is attracting more
majors because psychology is the one
field of liberal arts that has a little bit
to offer everyone,” he says.
One psychology course, the Sur
vey of Industrial/Organizational Psy
chology, has increased in popularity
among students, he says. The class
stresses theories and practices in or
ganizations, something that is im
portant to anyone interested in busi
ness.
Dr. John Sawyer, one of the de
partment’s new professors, currently
teaching the class, says, “T exas A&M
has always been an applied and prac
tical place and industrial/organiza
tional psychology is very applied and
practical. The class fits in with a
practical view of the world.”
Worchel says there are more peo
ple graduating with a psychology de
gree than ever before. The benefits,
he says, are that learning psychology
teaches people to think more crit
ically, ask questions and get answers.
There are concerns, however, that
the department is growing too fast.
Worchel says, “We’re having to
deal with the numbers. We don’t
don’t want to run people through
like a factory.”
Dr. Ludy Benjamin, who has been
teaching introductory psychology at
A&M for eight years, says bigger
classes pose problems for everyone,
and the quality of education the stu
dents are getting may be worse.
“The large classes hurt the op
tions of the teachers,” Benjamin
says. “We’re forced to use multiple-
choice exams because there isn’t
enough time to grade 250 essays. In
the long run, it’s a disadvantage to
the students because they aren’t able
to use practical applications of what
they’re learning.”
But Worchel says the department
is doing everything it possibly can to
maintain a high-quality department.
“We’ve recently added a bachelor
of arts program in addition to the
bachelor of science program,” he
says. Within the next few years,-.he. _
hopes to add honors courses to the
curriculum.