«. *' V V S
Wednesday, June 2, 2004
neI
THE BAXIAL
by Will Uoy<A
NEWS IN BRIEF
University training
vessel ordered
back to port
GALVESTON (AP) - A universi
ty’s annual summer training
cruise is on hold after a leak was
discovered on board the stu
dents’ vessel.
The Texas Clipper II serves as a
floating classroom for students of
Texas A&M at Galveston earning
their licenses to work as Merchant
Marine officers. It was to have
sailed to Port Canaveral, Fla., and
then on to Ireland, England and
Puerto Rico before returning to the
Lone Star State.
But shortly after departure, crew
members on Monday discovered a
problem with seals on the 394-foot
training vessel, Capt. Sam
Stephenson told the university’s
associate vice president for
research and academic affairs,
James McCloy.
Coast Guard rules enacteij,
the Sept. 11 terrorists attadul
vented the ship from
port on Monday. Ships arei:|
Coast Guard officials 901
notice before entering
ports, said McCloy.
The ship was anchored
shore late Monday evej
awaiting Coast Guard app.;
return to the dock at Texas!
at Galveston.
Loans
Continued from page 1
The share of poor students who borrowed
stayed about the same over the decade, almost 50
percent. Yet higher participation came among the
upper income range of the “average family.”
By 2000, about half of students from middle-
income families had taken out loans. Among
students at the highest end of the income range
— from families making $124,600 per year —
35 percent took loans, up from 13 percent in
1990. The loans often went toward more expen
sive schools.
“Families have just decided that this was a
good resource,” Choy said. “The loans are low-
interest. They’re easy to get — any student can
get them. They’re just deciding to borrow through
student loans as opposed to whatever else they
would have done, ... possibly even instead of
using savings.”
After grants and loans, the net price to stu
dents for all college expenses at public four-year
colleges remained the same from 1990 to 2000:
$8,000. But it took more loans to make that hap
pen, and after-college debt has become a grow
ing concern.
The report found that, on average, students
from the higher-income families had enough to
pay for college, while poorer ones still paid
more than their expected share under federal
standards.
The hope is that financial aid will keep]
so “tuition doesn’t outpace us at rates I
make it impossible for people to go to colt
said Sally Stroup, assistant secretary forp
ondary education.
In 2000, 71 percent of students got somelj
cial aid, up from 54 percent in 1990.
The college aid report is part of The Coni
of Education 2(X)4, an annual progress rep<|
student achievement gains, dropout rates, s.J
choice and many other measures.
wc
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Gasoline
Continued from page 1
the New York Mercantile Stock Exchange.
“There obviously is a fear premium,” said Seth Kleinman, an
oil market analyst at PFC Energy, a Washington-based consult
ing firm. While there always has been such a premium in oil
prices, with the targeting of Saudi’s oil industry, “It’s gotten a lot
further, and it’s gotten a lot bigger.”
One reason is that Saudi Arabia, which pumps 10 percent of
the world’s oil, is the only producer that has significant spare
capacity to produce more as needed to stem demand and prices,
economists said. While the attacks did not target Saudi pipelines,
terminals or oil fields directly, the psychological impact has rat
tled the markets.
After receding somewhat last week, the price of light crude
for July delivery jumped $2.45, settling Tuesday at a record
$42.33 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
“Increasing terrorist activities around the world and uncer
tainty and instability have driven oil prices over the last six
months. It’s not a lack of supply,” argues Fadel Gheit, an energy
strategist for Oppenheimer and Co. in New York.
Gheit estimates that when oil prices were at roughly $42 a
barrel, as much as $15 might have been generated by traders
pushing up prices because of worry over disruptions. Other esti
mates have put the fear premium at $5 to $12 a barrel.
The size of the premium, whatever it may be, is of less
importance than that it exists and has helped propel gasoline
prices to record levels to the current average of more than $2 a
gallon nationwide.
The cost of crude accounts for nearly half of the cost of a gal
lon of gasoline at retail pumps, according to the Energy
Department. Energy economists estimate an additional $1 in the
cost of crude adds 2.4 cents to the retail price of gasoline.
Analysts said tight crude supplies, growing demand and a
refining industry struggling to produce enough gasoline has
added to the gas price surge.
But the Khobar rampage and the killing on May 1 of six
Westerners at Yanbu, a Saudi refinery and petrochemical hub,
have escalated the fear factor because they dissolved the
notion that Saudi Arabia could protect its oil complexes,
according to analysts.
These incidents “have shattered the market’s confidence that
everything was well-protected in Saudi Arabia,” said Amy
Myers Jaffe, a director of energy programs at the James A. Baker
Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. “Before, there
were pipeline attacks in Iraq, general instability. But the (Saudi)
attacks turned ongoing anxiety into deep anxiety.”
Al-Qaida terrorists, claiming responsibility for the Khobar
attack, said the aim was to disrupt oil markets, psychologically if
not by blowing up a pipeline, oil terminal or tanker. A similar
message was made clear to oil markets when Iraqi insurgents
recently unsuccessfully targeted an Iraqi oil terminal.
Many oil industry analysts estimate that without the cloud of
uncertainty posed by terrorists and the continued violence in
Iraq, oil prices probably would be in the $30 range. They say
there’s still plenty of oil available.
Some analysts believe speculators are using the fear of possi
ble disruptions to game the system and push prices beyond
where they should be even assuming some disruption.
The Bush administration's high-profile stance that it will not
use its emergency government oil reserves has made it easier for
oil speculators to drive up prices, contends Jaffe.
“He is giving them (speculators) a security blanket,” agrees
Gheit of Oppenheimer, explaining that traders have been able to
push up prices for oil deliveries at a future date without fearing
they may be caught in a price squeeze if the governmerit should
release oil from its emergency stocks.
Has the fear premium become a permanent part of today’s
crude oil markets?
“The fear factor might narrow a little bit,” said Gheit. “But I
doubt it will completely disappear. We better get used to it.”
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Award
Continued from page 1
u
international as well.”
Kamprath said he had his share of inter
esting experiences with the event, including
when he was cleaning out a barn and found
a large snake his sophomore year.
“I didn’t want to kill it, but my friend
picked it up and chopped its head off,” he said.
Kamprath said one of his favorite memo
ries was when he planted flowers and painted
at a retirement home in Bryan his freshman
year. After completing the work, he and his
team went inside and talked to the residents.
“I don’t think they get a lot of interaction
with college students,” he said.
The Big Event is the largest one-day, stu
dent-run service organization in the world,
Kamprath said.
The Big Event is our way,
as college students at Texas
A&M, to say 'thank you' to
the community for putting
up with us...
— Richard Kamprath
senior electrical engineering major
He said students work all year and
attend weekly meetings, although it is a
one-day event.
"We start planning the next BigE
week after the Big Event happens,le
Cantu said The Big Event was
May IS and selected by an indepej
panel of judges from different parts ofl:
One overall youth winner til
announced at the June 16 conference.sit
Keep Brazos Beautiful had been
for several years to get enough inform
from The Big Event to nominate itfc
award, Glenn said.
“We figured if we could get itallte
er we knew that they would probaf
able to win,” she said.
Kamprath said he is happy Ik
Event is being recognized for help
improve the community.
“It shows a lot of work and dedi;
goes into it,” he said, “We’re really hap
receive an award that shows howgiea:
pie can be w hen they put a little effor ]
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Prosecutors open their case in thi
Peterson double-murder trial
fai
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By Brian Skoloff
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
REDWOOD CITY, Calif.
— Within a day of reporting
his pregnant wife missing,
Scott Peterson lied about his
extramarital affair, gave con
flicting accounts of his where
abouts and brushed off in-laws
helping search for Laci
Peterson, prosecutors said in
opening arguments of
Peterson’s murder trial
Tuesday.
Prosecutor Rick Distaso
wants jurors to connect those
dots, along with other circum
stantial evidence, to conclude
Peterson killed his wife.
Peterson, 31, could face the
death penalty or life without
parole if convicted in a trial
that is expected to last up to
six months.
From the moment Peterson
called his mother-in-law on
Christmas Eve 2002 and said he
had returned from a fishing trip
to an empty house, things didn’t
make sense, Distaso said.
“He says, ‘Mom, Laci’s
missing,”’ Distaso told jurors.
“Right then, Sharon Rocha
knew that things were very seri
ously wrong.”
By nightfall, family had
joined police to investigate a
missing person report h that
would unfold into a case that
captivated the nation.
Their search first focused on
a park near the couple’s
Modesto home, where Laci
Peterson, eight months preg
nant, used to walk the family’s
golden retriever before a doctor
recommended she stop because
of recurring dizziness.
In the park, a panicked
Rocha was rifling through
garbage cans in the fog-shroud
ed evening.
When she saw Scott
Peterson, she asked, ““What’s
going on ? Where were you fish
ing?’” Distaso said. After giving
Rocha “one-word respon
Peterson wandered off, the:
ecutor said.
Distaso ticked off wfc
implied were a series of
Peterson told.
Peterson told Rocha he
fishing on San Francisco
hut later told Laci PeteT
uncle and two neighbors lie
been golfing all day. He
was unable to tell policed
had been trying to catch d
fishing trip.
He told investigators th
never had an affair —a lie
would become very public
his mistress, massage thei
Amber Frey, stepped fom
Gates
Continued from page 1
excellence,” he said.
Texas A&M Board of
Regents member John D.
White was also encouraged by
the statistics.
“I’m very pleased with the
progress,” White said. “I think
the most important consideration
is our graduation rate, but Gates’
report validates the message that
we want students who can be
successful admitted to A&M.”
Student Body President Jack
Hildebrand said the fall admis
sion numbers show that Gates’
decision to use merit-based
admissions policy is effective.
“A&M has proven to be a
more welcoming place and a
unique environment for all stu
dents to attend,” Hildebrand said.
Anderson said there is no
concrete goal in terms of per
centages.
“Such an estimate would be
impossible because there are too
many complex factors in an
individual student’s decision on
which school to attend,”
Anderson said.
White says the administra
tion is still working on achiev-
c
ing a critical mass and
admissions numbers
reflect the population
state of Texas.
“We want to reflect thef
lation of the state ofl
because that’s who we’re lx
serve and the closer we a r
to that, the better off well
White said. “This is obvioii
dynamic process and
change over time.”
The Battalioi
Joshua Hobson, Editor in Chief
Elizabeth Webb, Managing Editor
Brian Cain, News Editor
Julie Bone, Aggielife Editor
Jordan Meserole, Sports Editor
George Deutsch, Opinion Editor
Liuren Rouse, Copy Chief
Ruben DeLuna, Graphics Editor
JP Beato III, Photo Editor
Kendra Kingsley, Radio Producer
Bing Shi, Webmaster
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