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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 11, 1995)
Page 6 • The Battalion Nation Monday • September||j w/a dozen t.v.’s in surround sound 500 draft • 500 bar drinks kickoff to half-time Chicago Green Bay Bears vs * Packers Diary sheds light on senator’s Plane ca relationship with lobbyists j^ng 0 ™ lo septen □ Sen. Bob Packwood kept detailed entries recording secret happenings on Capitol Hill. Footiong Hotdogs, Frito Pies, Nachos - Thundercloud Subs, Papa John’s Pizza Giveaways from Aggie 96 Live music late night with Last Call CarePlus Presents Roc, The Good Doc ^ ■ \V7 , / ,/oV PHARMACY 693-2957 MEDICAL CENTER 696-0683 "CLASSIC CASE OF ORIENTATION DIS-ORIENTATION , ‘ CarePlus Medical Center can take the confusion out of orientation for new Aggies. Our services include routine checkups and physicals, minor emergency care, immunizations, female exams, sports injuries, and colds and flu treatment. We even have an on-site pharmacy for one- stop medical care. Come to CarePlus Medical Center for all your medical needs. We'll orient you to quality care, plus value and convenience. A&M Students receive a 10 % discount. CarePlus ^ 2411-B Texas Ave. S. & Southwest Parkway Open all week in College Station WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Bob Packwood wrote his own headline for the behind-the-scenes dealings with lobbyists that helped lead to his downfall: “Republican Fat Cat Buys off Senator with Job to Senator’s Wife.” That diary entry, dated Dec. 10, 1990, is part of a rare glimpse into the backroom connections among money, politics and lobbyists that usually are only whispered about on Capitol Hill, if they are mentioned at all. The Oregon Republican had not slept the night before, worried that his divorce proceed ings would have to go to a public trial and the arrangements he had made with lobbyists and political backers to reduce his alimony payments would become known, resulting in headlines like the one he wrote. The Justice Department earlier this year de clined to prosecute Packwood for soliciting jobs for his former wife from the lobbyists. Yet the diaries provide unusual insights into how lobbyists and business executives sometimes exploit personal connections inside the Capitol. Excerpts were released last week by the Senate Ethics Committee. In one blunt entry, Packwood wrote that Ronald Crawford, a lobbyist with the firm F/P Research Associates, was helpful to him in rais ing money from Washington political action com mittees “because much of his income is depen dent on his relationship with me. He has got a vested interest in my staying in office.” In another, Packwood recounted a 1990 dinner conversation with Crawford in which the lobbyist offered to put up $7,500 a year to help support Packwood’s wife, Georgie, after their marriage broke up. “If you’re chairman of the Finance Committee, I can probably double that,” he quoted Crawford as saying. Packwood, who at the time was a se nior minority member of the tax-writing panel, later told the Ethics Committee the remark was meant as a joke. Packwood’s entries underscore that access to the powerful is the commodity that nets lobby ists their six-figure salaries. Once, he wrote, he let a group of officials from the American Iron and Steel Institute into his of fice only because Crawford was their lobbyist. Another time, Crawford came to Packwood’s of fice with a prospective client after explaining, “People hear that you’re tough to get to, and they know I can get to you.” Packwood wrote that he responded, “Well, that’s a happy relationship for all of us.” And on Sept. 13, 1989, Packwood recorded: “Ron Crawford was in. He had a special problem involving the transfer of partnership properties. ... what its tax consequences are. He said his client was Shell Oil and this was very, very im portant to him personally. He said, ‘I know how much you hate the oil companies.’ I said, ‘Ron, I still hate the oil companies but I’ll do you a favor.’” * Crawford, in a deposition before the ethics panel, said he didn’t offer Georgie Packwood a job based on any request from the senator, but said he had considered hiring her part-time. He acknowledged that his contacts with Packwood and his former aides were important to his lob bying business. “A lot of the former staffers are sprinkled throughout the administration,” he said. An an nual party for Packwood associates at his home “is just an attempt to enhance my own business opportunities through those people, contacts, whatever they might be,” Crawford added. Two of Packwood’s job solicitations for his for- I * mer wife underscored the importance of personal relationships forged when lobbyists begin their careers as congressional aides. Steven R. Saunders, who represents Japan’s Mitsubishi Corp. in Washington, worked for Packwood for four years on Capitol Hill; Tim Lee, owner of an Oregon freight logistics compa ny and a major Packwood fund raiser, once was an intern for Packwood. Saunders had an interest in a patent dispute between his employer and a U.S. competitor that had landed in Congress’ lap, the Ethics Commit tee found. Lee, although not a lobbyist, had an interest in legislation to overturn a Supreme Court decision that could have hurt his trucking business, the panel said. [ m SHACKLEFORDS. \ — A plane carrying 11 bers of a skydiving crashed into a house ploded on Sunday, k man sitting on his back and everyone aboard. The house caught authorities said no one ing in the row of about 10 es along a woodsy lane in Tidewater Virginia was Mattie Byrd was lyii bed when she heard the laboring overhead: "I.., the plane in the air, turned like it wanted back the other way, tkj made a nosedive. “1 was assuming it was ing in the back dooro! house. It sounded like itwasl ing through something, then it went boom. By the we got outside, it had blown there was fire eveiywhere,’ A body count at the so confirmed there were 11 on the plane, said MaryEv a state police spokesworai She said their names wo: not be released until Mond; Byrd said her neighbor, cent Harris, owned a trui company and moonlighted Baptist minister, was kil but his son, Vincent Jr., wh S or 9, was playing outside wasn’t injured. The plane, a Beechcn Queen Air BE-65, went about 6:45 p.m. just east Shacklefords, about 40 ml east of Richmond. It crash about 15 minutes after taki from West Point Municipal Airport, said Arlene Salac, spokeswoman for the Fedenl Aviation Administration. □ Lav was a [night ing hi I pel LIN Lawrer I braska four toi arreste legedly and wa team. “We to help gether, the foot diately,’ Phill woman a Linco dent w£ a.m., L The pla at abou leased e 10 perc $100. Wooi legedly outside woman serious! “Alle her and Gingrich urges against independent candidacy ment o said. Philli cion of n □ The current Speaker of the House wants Gen. Colin Powell to remain in the current party system. WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker Newt Gingrich urged re tired Gen. Colin Powell to give up any idea of an independent candidacy, say ing Sunday that having a president out side the cur rent party sys tem is “a joke” that could lead to disaster. Gingrich, in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” also revealed some details of the GOP plan to restore fiscal integrity to Medicare, including a proposal to apply means-testing to couples earning more than $125,000. Powell, in his new autobiogra phy, says he is comfortable with neither party and the time may be ripe for the rise of a third party to represent the political cental I America. He makes no cifnMi ment to lead such a party. Gingrich, R-Ga., strongly urga him against that course. “I thini it’s frankly in the long run a joke,' he said. “This country is a party country. ... There is no magic hide' pendence of people who are j able to stand up and magically produce a government.” An independent presidency would be te< Powell Gingrich disaster for this country,” he said. If Poweli, former chair man of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, ran as a Republican, he would im mediately be come the chief rival to GOP Sen. Bob Dole, front-runner Gingrich said. Gingrich, like Powell, says he will make no announcement of his own presidential intentions until the end of the year. He has stated that he would take a pass if Powell were to run as a Republican, but in any case is leaning against en tering the race. HOU didn’t h ODormt made ce miss the Andr game’s touchdc subbing directec victory Sn AS A STOCKBROKER OLDE Discount Stocksrokers Member New York Stock E x c h a n g e / S I P C Invited You To Attend A Presentation About the Brokerage Industry It’s every vv '^ iere -you want to be. DATE; TIME; PLACE; Monday, September 18, 1995 7:00 p.m. Memorial Student Center Room 292B d £ For more information, please contact: 1-800-872-6533 ‘ If you ve ever considered a career as a stockbroker., you don’t want to miss this” Visa U.S.A. Inc. 1995 ^OLDE America's Full Service Discount Broker" Member NYSE & SI PC [ An Equal Opportunity Employer J □ Emr for 11 scorec touch