Banner Graphic, Volume 22, Number 223, Greencastle, Putnam County, 22 May 1992 — Page 2

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THE BANNERGRAPHIC May 22,1992

Administration defends its pre-war policy toward Iraq

WASHINGTON (AP) Democrats are calling U.S. support for Iraq during the 1980 s tragically flawed and possibly criminal. Republicans say that at most it was foolish. The administration says the policy was right at the time, although ultimately it failed. Many Democrats argue that U.S. policy led Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to believe he could get away with invading Kuwait. The administration says it thought its policy would contain Saddam and that it didn’t have the benefit of hindsight. THE ARGUMENTS were aired Thursday at a hearing convened by the chairman of the House Banking Committee, Texas Democrat Henry Gonzalez, who has been leading the attack on the administration’s preGulf War support for Iraq. “The administration hoped to moderate Iraq’s behavior by providing Saddam Hussein with billions of dollars in financial assistance and U.S. technology,” Gonzalez said. “I find it hard to understand how the behavior of the new Adolf Hitler as President Bush has since referred to Saddam could have been modified,” Gonzalez told nine officials he invited to testify. BUT ONE OF the architects of that policy, Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger, told the hearing that the administration had hoped to contain Saddam by giving him sufficient political and economic incentive. The decision to support Iraq, he said, stemmed from a desire to ensure a plentiful and inexpensive source of oil, to prevent undue Iranian or Soviet influence in the Persian Gulf and Middle East, and to provide U.S. farmers with a

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LAWRENCE EAGLEBURGER ‘Clear policy didn’t work’

growing market for their rice and wheat He said the administration had criticized Iraq for its abysmal human rights record, although he conceded that “consideration of that record did not specifically affect the State Department’s” decisions. “IT IS CLEAR that policy didn’t work,” Eagleburger conceded. “One can play the role of Monday morning quarterback,” said John Robson, deputy Treasury secretary. “But, as is often the case in policy-making ... decisions are based on imperfect information and without the ability to predict the future.” The United States guaranteed some $5 billion in loans for agriculture exports to Iraq about $2 billion of which Iraq has not repaid

Two House post office workers may be key to members

WASHINGTON (AP) Testimony of two top House Post Office employees could determine whether lawmakers become the focus of two separate investigations into the postal facility, according to congressional sources. “They’re absolutely crucial.

Banner Graphic (USPS 142-020) Con*olid»tion of Tho Doily Banner Established 1850 The Herald The Daily Graphic Eatabliahedlßß3 Telephone 653-5151 Published daily except Sunday and Holidaya by Banner Graphic, Inc. at 100 North Jackson St., Greencaatle, 1N.46135. Second-class postage paid at Greencastle, IN. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to the Banner Graphic, P. O. Box 509, Greencaatle IN 46135. Subscription Rates Per Week, by carrier $1.40 Per Week, by motor route $1.45 Mail Subscription Rates R.R. IN Rest of Rest of Putnam Co. Indiana U.S.A. 3 Mor.ths $21.00 $23.00 $25.00 6 Months $40.00 $45.00 $50.00 1 Year $78.00 $86.00 $95.00Mail subscriptions payable in advance ... not accepted in town and where motor route service is available. Member of the Associated Press The Associated Press is entitled exclusively to the use for republication of all the local news printed in this newspaper. Steve Hendershot General Manager/ Marketing Director Eric Bern see „ Editor Wilbur C. Kendall Production Manager Gib Farmer Business Manager June Leer Circulation Manager

and the Bush administration is repaying. BUT EAGLEBURGER and other witnesses disputed reports that some of the guaranteed loans were used by Iraq to buy weapons. He said all investigations to date as well as indictments against officials of the Italian-owned bank through which the money was funneled have failed to find evidence of such a diversion. Agriculture Undersecretary Richard Crowder testified that lacking such evidence, he had recommended the guarantees to Iraq continue in 1990 at the level of the previous year He said the Agriculture Department investigated but did not find any evidence of a diversion. He conceded that department investigators who went to Baghdad had not found actual proof that U.S. farm commodities had arrived there. HE SAID THE Iraqis had produced massive amounts of documents in Arabic, but the U.S. team didn’t have the resources to translate them. The Banking Committee is investigating whether such a diversion occurred. A leading Republican on the panel, Jim Leach of lowa, said that while the administration should be “red faced” over its faulty policy toward Iraq, “there is no evidence that policy-makers were malevolent or corrupt.” Eagleburger noted that the State Department had provided the committee with more than 4,000 documents to explain its Iraq policy although additional ones would be forthcoming only if Gonzalez promises to stop revealing their contents.

They are basically the two individuals who will corroborate or not corroborate the great majority of allegations that have been raised,” against members, said one congressional source Thursday, speaking only on condition of anonymity. “THEY WERE AMONG three or four people who were part of dealings with members on the things that have been alleged,” the source said. Congressional sources identified the two senior employees as James Smith, director of accountable papers at the post office, and Joanna O’Rourke, chief of staff. Neither has been charged with any offense. Both Smith, who was in charge of the clerics and their stamp-and-cash drawers, and O’Rourke, the No. 3-ranking official at the post office, are on leave. They could not be reached for comment. A FEDERAL grand jury in Washington and a House Administration Committee task force are investigating alleged mismanagement of the postal facility. Grand jury indictments and convictions so far have focused on charges of embezzlement and drugdealing by employees at the post office. U.S. Attorney Jay Stephens’ office has expressed concern that the House investigation could inter-

Mom’s marriage plans may have caused shooting

TERRE HAUTE, Ind. (AP) Authorities say a father who committed suicide after killing his three children might have been reacting to the mother’s plans to marry another man. “We’re trying to be rational about why an irrational man would do such a terrible act, taking these children’s lives,” Lt. John Harpold of the Vigo County Sheriff’s Department said Thursday. JON PATRICK Vermillion, 31,

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Ex-Marine executed in Texas HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) A former Marine joked with witnesses before he was executed by injection early today for hiring a hitman through a magazine advertisement to kill his wife. “I look stretched out like a cooked goose,” said Robert Black, who was strapped on a gurney as three relatives and an attorney entered the death chambcr. BLACK, 45, hired John Wayne Hearn to kill his wife, Sandra, at their Bryan home in 1985. Hearn offered himself for “high-risk assignments” through an advertisement in Soldier of Fortune magazine. Evidence showed Black paid Hearn SIO,OOO and stood to collect on $175,000 in recently purchased life insurance. Evidence also showed he planned to marry his cousin. Hearn pleaded guilty to fatally shooting Mrs. Black and testified against Black in exchange for a life prison term. LAWYERS FOR Black, a former Marine captain, contended he suffered from posttraumatic stress syndrome from his Vietnam combat service. But the U.S. Supreme Court voted 63 to deny a reprieve late Thursday. ' As the drugs began to flow, Black began reciting the poem “High Flight,” written by American airman John Gillespie Magee Jr. during World War 11. Magee, then 19, was killed while serving as a volunteer with the Royal Canadian Air Force.

sere with the grand jury’s work. The chairman of the House task force, Rep. Charles Rose, D-N.C., said he has agreed to hold off questioning O’Rourke and Smith until June 15 at the earliest to avoid a conflict. THE OFFICE expense records of three House members were subpoenaed by the federal grand jury investigation two weeks ago. The lawmakers are Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski, D--111., and two veteran Pennsylvania Democrats, Austin Murphy and Joseph Kolter. Congressional sources said the House task force has investigated but not resolved allegations that lawmakers bought stamps at the House Post Office for official purposes and later turned them in for cash, and also that they used the post office as a personal checkcashing agency. The panel also has investigated allegations that House Post Office employees picked up campaign checks from a post office box in Washington and delivered them to lawmakers’ offices, the sources said. SUCH ACTIONS could violate either U.S. postal regulations or federal law. The House Post Office has operated as a contract agency of the U.S. Postal Service, staffed by House employees. The congressional sources said O’Rourke and Smith could have

shot and killed his daughters Amanda Jo Mann, 3¥i, and Kristi Nicole Mann, 2, and his 7-month-old son Jon Michael Vermillion on Wednesday before killing himself, police said. Harpold said Vermillion and Jessie Mann, the children’s mother, separated about two months ago. They weren’t married. Mann had plans to get married Sunday to another man, Harpold said.

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Lawmakers say USDA policy will increase school lunch prices

WASHINGTON (AP) Schools will charge students more for a hot lunch this fall, when the Agriculture Department ends the flour giveaways that have helped cafeterias nationwide stretch their budgets, officials say. They say the department can no longer give surplus flour to school cafeterias, nursing homes, Indian reservations and feeding programs for the poor because the government’s grain bins are bare. ONE REASON for the dwindling reserves, officials say, is the aggressive use of export subsidies that have helped U.S. farmers sell wheat, flour and other goods at bargain prices around the world. “The victims of the new policy are the school lunches, the elderly nutrition programs and the charities those without powerful lobbies to defend their cause,” said Rep. Bob Wise, D-W.Va., who chairs the House Government Operations subcommittee on agriculture. Advocates of the Export Enhancement Program argue that it has little effect on the school situation because the cafeterias get government flour and foreign countries are buying privately owned wheat. Also, they note, the bonus flour amounts to just a fraction of the

Perot, Bush tied in poll

WASHINGTON (AP) Ross Perot is running neck and neck with President Bush, according to a poll released today, but few of those surveyed think the Texas billionaire has a good chance of winning the White House. Perot and Bush each won the support of 35 percent of those questioned in the USA Today-CNN-Gallup poll, while likely Democratic nominee Bill Clinton garnered 25 percent. A MONTH AGO, the poll put Bush at 41 percent, Clinton at 26 percent and Perot at 25 percent. While today’s poll showed Bush and Perot in a dead heat, only one in five of those interviewed thinks Perot has a good chance of winning the presidency and 55 percent said they know little or nothing about him. The poll, conducted among 804 people nationwide Monday

the knowledge to resolve conflicting questions on member involvement. There already have been four guilty pleas by former House Post Office employees in the grand jury

“It’s quite possible that’s what set it off,” Harpold said. OTHER AUTHORITIES said Vermillion and Mann were battling over child custody rights. Harpold said police had been called to Vermillion’s trailer home in northeast Terre Haute numerous times because of domestic disputes. Vermillion had picked up the children earlier Wednesday and Ms. Mann asked the sheriff’s department to help her retrieve them be-

wheat being exported. “TO THAT I SIMPLY say: sell it to the American taxpayers. Ask them if they would prefer to spend their money on helping foreign consumers or American school children,” Wise said Thursday at a hearing by his panel. The Agriculture Department is spending $1.2 billion this year on the Export Enhancement Program, much of it to subsidize wheat sales abroad. “Bonus” flour donations, on the other hand, will total $22 million. Schools and other feeding programs also receive wheat and other commodities as “entitlements,” based on how many meals or individuals are served. ALTHOUGH FLOUR will still be available as an entitlement next year, school officials argue that their budgets will be stretched thin by the loss of the bonus flour. “The loss of bonus commodity flour will have a disastrous economic impact on the child nutrition programs within the state of West Virginia,” Wade R. Leech, director of food service for Wood County Schools in Parkersburg, W.Va., said at the hearing.

through Wednesday, has a margin of error of 4 percentage points. It also found: • In a two-way race, Bush leads Clinton 50 percent to 39 percent. • 66 percent say Bush has a good chance of winning in November; Clinton, 21 percent; Perot, 20 percent. • 48 percent say the would “never support” Clinton; 39 percent say the same about Bush, and 36 percent about Perot. ON THURSDAY, an Ohio poll showed Bush and Clinton trailing Perot. It showed Perot with 25 percent of the support among state voters, Bush with 23 percent and Clinton with 15 percent. Bush was running third in California. A Los Angeles Times poll put Perot’s support at 39 percent, Clinton at 26 percent and Bush at 25 percent.

probe. Charges included embezzlement, conspiracy to cover up embezzlement, and drug use. Another ex-worker is awaiting trial on drug distribution and embezzlement charges.

cause she expected problems from the father, said Sheriff James R. Jenkins. THE SHOOTINGS occurred between 4 p.m. and 5 p.m. EST Wednesday in a trailer park in northeast Terre Haute. The father was found in the bedroom, dead of a single shotgun wound to the head, authorities said. The children were shot in the back of the head with a .22-caliber rifle. EVIDENCE MISSING INDIANAPOLIS (AP) An internal investigation is under way at the Indianapolis Police Department after more than $17,000 worth of cash and jewelry disappeared from the crime evidence room. Investigators have been conducting interviews, reviewing procedures and giving lie detector tests to property room officers and civilian employees. Narcotics officers informed the department’s Internal Affairs Division in February that the cash was missing and an investigation began. The jewelry was discovered missing after Deputy Chief Dan Overly asked for an audit of all inventory in the property room.