• _ Daily^
Page \JDTA7C S d" Assorted press Nebraskan
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Bush sends 'investment in future’budget to Congress
WASHINGTON - President Bush
on Monday sent Congress a $1.23
trillion budget for fiscal 1991 that
keeps new spending below inflation
and recognizes “remarkable changes”
in the world by scaling back defense
and rewarding emerging democra
cies.
Bush called the spending plan an
“investment in the future.” But
Democratic leaders in Congress
pounced on it as a4 ‘standpat budget”
and challenged its claim to halve the
federal deficit, to $63.1 billion.
Fights loomed with the Dcmocratic
controllcd Congress on a range of
fronts: Bush’s desire to cut Medicare
and capital gains taxes, to close mili
tary bases he considers outmoded and,
on the other hand, to preserve some
expensive weapons.
Bush would increase spending on
space, education, the environment and
the war on drugs. Losers, this year,
are Medicare, college student loans,
farm subsidies, energy conservation
grants and mass transit.
The president’s budget for the fis
cal year that begins Oct. 1 calls for
S36.5 billion in spending cuts and
other deficit-reduction measures.
It projects a 7 percent increase in
revenues, to $1.17 trillion, without a
general tax increase and just a 3 per
cent boost in overall spending -- more
than a percentage point below the
current rale of inflation.
Bush proposed defense spending
of $292.1 billion, a cut of 2 percent
measured against inflation; while
boosting foreign aid to Eastern Eu
rope, the Philippincsand Latin Amer
ica.
On the domestic front, his budget
would leave in place the Social Secu
rity tax increase that took effect ear
lier this month. But it honors Bush’s
1988 campaign pledge to propose no
general lax increase.
. Still, the budget recommends $15.6
billion in lesser tax increases and a
$5.6 billion increase in user and serv
ice fees - most of them recycled from
Reagan budgets and previously de
feated in Congress. ,
The budget calls for “ family sav
ings’’ accounts under which families
could bank up to $5,000 a year and
pay no lax on interest on deposits held
for seven or more years.
“With an eye toward future growth,
and expansion of the human frontier,
the budget’s chief emphasis is on
investment in the future,” Bush said
in a brief message to Congress ac
Bush’s farm and deficit proposals
get mixed reaction from delegation
President George Bush unveiled
his budget proposal Monday to praise
and criticism from members of Ne
braska’s congressional delegation.
Bush’s proposal to eliminate the
Federal Crop Insurance Corp. drew
criticism from Sen. Bob Kerrey and
Rep. Virginia Smith.
“I think it’s a mistake,” said Kerrey,
a Democrat and member of the Sen
ate Agriculture Committee.
Kerrey said there are problems with
the crop insurance program but ad
ministration officials have not made
a good fault effort to improve the
agency.
A crop insurance commission made
26 recommendations but the admini
stration has only implemented three,
Kerrey said Monday.
“They ought to get new manage
ment,” Kerrey said. ”... I think the
program can be self-sustaining.”
The Bush proposal calls for scal
ing back the crop insurance corpor
tion, which provides subsidies to farm
ers who carey all-risk protection for
crop loss. The agency’s budget -S1.2
million this fiscal year - would fall to
S430.000.
In place of the crop insurance
program, a new disaster assistance
program would be worked out with
Congress.
Kerrey said relying on a disaster
assistance program would put Con
gress in risk-management business, a
business Congress should not be. in.
Mrs. Smith, a Republican, said she
is concerned that “agricultural pro
grams arc being asked to take unde
fined cuts in programs and bear an
unfair share of the burden in deficit
reduction efforts.’’
Kerrey also said he was concerned
that Bush’s budget coupled with
Agriculture Department policies would
mean reduction in target prices and a
cut in net farm income.
Bush’s proposal pushes off tough
decisions until 1993 “as if he’s run
ning for re-election,” Kerrey said.
Mrs. Smith said a close look at
budget recommendations for commod
ity and rural programs seems to indi
calc that the “Office of Management
and B udgei, as they ha ve in past years,
is unaware of the different needs of
and issues facing rural America.”
Sen. Jim Exon called the budget a
“political document which docs not
fully face up to the serious economic
crisis created by continuing annual
deficits and rapidly growing national
debt.”
Exon, a Democrat and member of
the Senate Budget Committee, said
the budget doesn’t realistically come
near to meeting the Gramm-Rudman
budget deficit target
“Optimistic economic assump
tions, unspecified spending reductions
and the huge surpluses in the nation’s
trust funds, including the Social Se
curity Trust Fund, are used to hide the
true magnitude of the budget defi
cit,” Exon said.
Exon did applaud the president for
initiatives that call for simulating
savings and investment and a new
tree-planting and reforestation initia
tive.
Survey shows disapproval of regents
A newspaper poll shows that only
38 percent of the people surveyed ap
prove of the job the NU Board of
Regents is doing.
The poll also found most of those
surveyed favored election of the re
gents, agreed NU’s Lincoln campus
should be the state’s flagship of higher
education and the Omaha campus
should allow doctoral degrees.
Thirty-five percent of the 450 people
polled Jan. 15-17 by National Re
search Corp. don’t know how to as
sess the board. Twenty-seven percent
disapproved of the board’s perform
ance.
State Sen. Ron Withem of Papil
lion, chairman of the Legislature’s
Education Committee, said the 27
percent disapproval rating is high
compared with most polls evaluating
the performance of public officials.
I-"—
‘‘I think a 27 percent disapproval
rating is very high for a board like the
Board of Regents,’ ’ Withcm said. ‘41
would not perceive the poll as reflect
ing a strong vote of confidence by the
people in the immediate past leader
ship.”
Withem was referring to the board
of regents under the leadership of
Nancy Hoch of Nebraska City.
During Hoch’s tenure as chair
man, the board was criticized for not
telling the public why it fired former
President Ronald Roskcns and for not
taking a stand on whether Kearney
State College should become part of
the university system.
Hoch was chairman until early
January when Don Blank of McCook
was elected to that office.
The poll has an error range of plus
--1
Nebraskan
Editor Amy Edwards Graphics Editor John Bruce
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Copy Desk Editor Darcle Wlegert Advertising Manager Jon Daehnke
Sports Editor Jell Apel Sales Manager Kerry Jeffries
Arts & Entertainment Publications Board
Editor Michael Deeds Chairman Pam Hein
Diversions Editor Mick Dyer 472-2588
Sower Editor Lae Rood Professional Adviser Don Walton
473-7301
The Daily Nebraskan(USPS 144 080) is published by the UNL Publications Board, Ne
braska Union 34,1400 R St., Lincoln, NE, Monday through Friday during the academic year,
weekly during summer sessions
Readers are encouraged to submit story ideas and comments to the Daily Nebraskan by
phoning 472-1763 between 9 a m and 5 p.m Monday through Friday. The public also has
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Subscription price is $45 for one year.
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ALL MATERIAL COPYRIGHT 1990 DAILY NEBRASKAN
or minus 4.6 percent, said National
Research, which conducted the poll
for The, Lincoln Star and Lincoln
Journal.
Poll results also indicated the public
is nearly split, with 45 percent against
and 44 percent for a complicated
constitutional amendment to restruc
ture the governance of higher educa
tion institutions across the slate.
Only 11 percent of Nebraskans
don’t know whether to vole for or
against the constitutional change that
would abolish the NU Board of Re
gents and the State Colleges Board of
Trustees and replace them with a new
Board of Regents to coordinate the
slate’s seven four-year schools.
Overwhelmingly, Nebraskans want
regents to be elected rather than ap
pointed by the governor. Eighty-nine
percent of those polled want the re
gents to be elected, while 7 percent
favor the governor appointing them
and 4 percent don t know how they
should be chosen.
On the issue of doctoral degrees at
UNO, 79 percent said UNO should be
allowed to join UNL and the NU
Medical Center in offering those
degrees, while 9 percent said no and
11 percent had no opinion.
On whether the Lincoln campus
should remain the flagship of any
four-year educational system, 54
percent said it should, 30 percent said
it should not and 17 percent didn’t
know.
On the question of whether the
UNL chancellor should also be the
president of the Nebraska University
system, 51 percent of those polled
were opposed, 21 percent favored the
change and 22percent said they don’t
know.
:ompanying the 1,569-page document.
But Sen. James Sasser, D-Tenn„
;alled it a document of “low aspira
tions_It predicts huge fiscal prob
lems ahead and then goes on to pro
pose no change in course.”
And House Majority Leader Rich
ard Gephardt, D-Mo., said, “1 think
it’s a standpat budget” but he said
lawmakers would “take it very seri
Dusly” rather than pronouncing it
“dead on arrival” as Democrats had
done with several Reagan budgets.
Bush’s budget asserted it was
meeting the $64 billion delicit target
for fiscal 1991, under the Gramm
Rudman budget balancing law, “with
specific and defensible measures
and without gimmicks.”
However, critics claimed the
administration’s prescription for get
ting the budget dericii down to l
billion -- from a projected $123.8
billion this year -- does rely on ac
counting gimmicks.
“They continue to jimmy the fig
ures,” said Sen. Ernest F. Hollings,
D-S.C. ‘‘It’s another fraud.”
For one thing, Bush’s budget uses
an optimistic set of economic projec
tions that assume both declining inter
est rates and falling inflation. The
budget also calls for overall growth
this year of 2.4 percent this year -
compared to the 1.7 percent forecast
by private forecasters and the Con
gressional Budget Office.
The government’s most recent
figures showed economic growth
slowed to an annual rate of 0.5 per
cent during the last three months of
1989.
-1
^ John Bruce/Daily Nebraskan
I
Expenment shows computer
as good as human therapist
NEW YORK - Depressed pa
tients who were treated by com
puter during an experiment im
proved as much as those who con
sulted a human therapist, suggest
ing an economical treatment for a
condition afflicting millions.
Depression strikes about 10
million Americans within any six
month period. Human therapists
can now treat only a fraction of that
number, but using computers might
let them reach more, said researcher
Greist, a psychiatry professor at
the University of Wisconsin Medi
cal School in Madison.
Computerized treatment could
be provided day and night at a cost
of perhaps only 50 cents an hour,
he said. And unlike a human thera
pist, a computer ‘ ‘doesn’t have bad
days,” he said.
Humans would still be needed
to screen patients for the therapy
and to step in if the computer fails
to treat the patient adequately, he
said in a recent interview. And the
therapeutic approach used in the
study works best for people with
only mild to moderate depression,
he said.
The study compared the prog
ress of 12 depressed people who
received therapy from a computer,
12 who consulted a therapist, and
12 who received no treatment dur
ing the experiment.
The two treated groups followed
a six-week course of weekly cog
nitive-behavioral therapy. This
approach aims to correct harmful
patterns in how people interpret
theirexperiences, such as in people
who habitually pcrcciv6 slights and
conclude that they must be unliked
and worthless.
The therapist’s job in this ap
proach is fairly routine and can
become repetitious, Grclsl said.
Using a program designed by
coauthor Paulette Sclmi, a com
puter asked such questions as how
long a person had felt depressed
and which activities in a list made
the person feel better. It also asked
about particular symptoms and
asked the person to rank the sever
ity of his depression on a standard
scale.
Responses to the computer’s
multiple-choice questions shaped
the course of each session and fu
ture sessions.
The actual therapy included
teaching basics of cognitive-be
havioral therapy, testing the per
son’s understanding of the les
sons, and assigning homework.
Depending on the person’s prob
lems, the homework could include
such tasks as assigned reading,
thinking about less damaging
explanations for perceived slights
or introducing oneself to new
people daily to discover that one
is not always rejected.
Analysis showed that, as a
group, patients who took compu
terized therapy improved as much
as those in the other treated group,
both at the conclusion of treat
ment and two months later. Both
groups improved significantly
more than the people who had
received no therapy.
The study is presented in this
month’s issue of the American
Journal of Psychiatry by Sclmi,
Greist and others at the univer
sity.
T. Byram Karasu, professor of
psychiatry at the Albert Einstein
College of Medicine in New York,
called the new work important.
But he cautioned that cogni
tive-behavioral therapy is gener
ally less effective for depression
than other strategics, including
medication.
He also stressed that while
computers might be useful for some
aspects of psychotherapy, they
cannot totally replace a human
therapist. Mostdcprcssed patients
arc “starving for human contact,”
he said.
