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About The daily Nebraskan. ([Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 20, 1990)
d 1 CJT fp^ C2 *8* Associated Press X ^1 %** f w slJ JL^ 1£»V %r Edited by Brandon Loomis Economists predictions go from recession to expansion WASHINGTON - The weather isn’t the only thing behaving strangely this winter. The economy has been topsy turvy as well. In just two months, December and January, many economists went from predicting an impending economic downturn to believing that the long est peacetime expansion in history has found another of its nine lives. The new general consensus of moderate economic growth this year is likely to be an important element in Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan’s testimony before Con gress today when he reveals the Fed’s policy targets for 1990. These targets will have a major influence on inter est rates and economic growth. Greenspan could be excused for expressing a certain amount of per plexity about recent events. In December, the economic out look was as bleak as the unusually cold weather. Housing construction plunged; Christmas sales were lack luster, and the overall economy, as measured by the gross national prod uct, turned in its worst showing in 3 1/ 2 years. All that gloom prompted reces sion worries as economists feared the impending demise of the seven-year old economic recovery, an expansion that has already lasted almost five times longer than usual. But in January, the weather warmed and so did the economy. Housing construction soared 29.6 percent, the biggest monthly increase on record. Retail sales rebounded, largely on the strength of a pickup in auto demand, and the economy produced 275,000 new jobs, almost triple the December increase. The gtxxi news chased away the recession forecasts. Some analysts now look for 3 percent annual growth in the January-March quarter, six times the pace from October through De cember. “The economy is doing a lot bet ter than a lot of people thought it would,” said Michael Evans, head ol a Washington forecasting firm. “Everything we have seen so far this year has been strong.” Part of the rebound is almost cer tainly weather-related. The warmest January on record spurred business activity, which had been depressed in December. But Evans and many of his col leagues believe that, even taking account of January’s weather, the economy is staging a modest revival from the depressed fourth quarter. Greenspan, in an unusually candid comment, said that the chance of a recession had diminished markedly since last spring and that the fourth quarter’s sluggish growth was likely to prove only a “temporary hesita tion.’’ Economists believe Greenspan will restate those views Tuesday and arc not looking for any immediate credit easing on the part of the central bank, especially in light of current infla tionary pressures. In January, wholesale prices surged upward at an annual rate of more than 24 percent, the fastest clip since the oil shock of the early 1970s. Analysts are expecting a similarly worrisome increase in January’s consumer prices, which will be released Wednesday. While the inflation spike can be explained by temporary factors such as the December freeze, which drove food prices higher, economists said the Fed would still find the pace too troublesome to ignore. The Fed docs not want to be per ceived as easing at a time when infla tion is accelerating, even if those inflationary pressures were consid ered to be temporary,” said David Jones, chief economist at Aubrey G. Lanston & Co., a government securi ties dealer. That could set up a potential clash with the Bush administration, which has been complaining over the last year that the Greenspan-led Fed has not been aggressive enough in push ing interest rates down to spur eco nomic growth. In addition to releasing the Fed’s 1990 targets for growth of the money supply, which influences interest rales, Greenspan will also reveal the Fed’s economic forecast for the year. Cheney tells Filipino officials America might abandon bases MANILA, Philippines - Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, shunned by Philippine President Corazon Aquino, told Filipino officials Monday that the United States will abandon its bases here if it finds that keeping them is too expensive or that Americans are unwelcome. As violence was reported in several clashes between leftist protesters and police near U.S. installations, Cheney met for nearly three hours with Defense Minister Fidel Ramos in discussions that i were described as "very cordial, very forthright.” Meeting reporters afterward with Ramos, Cheney said the United States “will stay only as long as the Philippine people wish it to stay — and only if the terms nego tiated are acceptable to both par ties.” There is growing opposition in the Philippines to the bases, which are among the largest outside the continental United Stales. In 1988 the United States agreed to pay the Philippines about $960 million to maintain the facilities until their lease expired in 1991, but this year Congress significantly cut finan cial aid to the bases. About 200 members of the left ist League of Filipino Students, chanting “Yankees go home!” marched to the U.S. Embassy and hurled bottles and rotten tomatoes at police, who charged them with clubs and tear gas. One student was arrested and at least four policemen were injured in the protest, which occurred near Cheney’s hotel. Earlier, 50 stu dents burned an effigy of Cheney and picketed the military headquar ters with banners reading “Cheney warmonger, go home’’ and “White monkey, go home with your bases.” In Angeles City, home of Clark Air Base about 50 miles north of Manila, about 300 protesters hurled rocks at club-wielding police who tried to stop them from disman tling barbed wire barricades at the entrance. Demonstrators said about 30 students were injured. Relations between the two al lies have reached new lows in re cent weeks. President Cora/on Aquino re fused to see Cheney, citing the aid cuts and anger over what officials consider adverse reports about her government in the American press. This year, the Bush administra tion asked Congress for $360 mil lion in funding, but the figure was cut by $96 million, and U.S. diplo mats say it is unlikely the money will be restored. ‘ ‘We recognize there is a short fall of $96 million over what we had anticipated,” Cheney said. ”1 also pointed out that in East Asia, in this part of the world, the United States provided a little over $600 million, and about $500 million of that comes specifically to the Phil ippines.” Cheney pledged his “best ef forts” to restore funding cut by Congress. He also denied reports in the Philippine press the cutbacks signal diminished support for the Aquino govemmert. Ramos acknowledged the U.S. administration needs congressional approval for aid commitments, but said he told Cheney ‘ ‘time is of the essence” in meeting obligations. Asked whether Filipinos wanted die bases to remain, Ramos de clined to answer, saying the issue was under discussion in the Philip pine Congress. U.S. and Filipino officials arc expected to begin talks soon on extending the bases. Any agree ment must be approved by two thirds of the 23-mcmbcr Philip pine Senate, where anti-bases sen timent is strong. No date for the talks has been set, and leading Filipino congress men have urged Mrs. Aquino to postpone them until the cuts arc restored. Officials say natural carcinogens more dangerous than chemicals NEW ORLEANS - Natural car cinogens in meat, grain and other foods are a far greater danger than pesticides and additives, accounting for more than 98 percent of the cancer risk in the diet, a government scien tist said Monday. Even a minor reduction in these naturally occurring hazards, he said, would surpass the benefits of elimi nating all traces of dangerous man made chemicals. The culprits include not only such recognized health hazards as fats and beer but such seemingly innocent products as bread, yogurt, mushrooms and many spices, including cinna mon and nutmeg. “The risk is from natural carcino gens in the diet, because they over whelm all the others,” said Dr. Robert Schcuplcin, director of the Office of Toxicological Sciences at the U S. Food and Drug Administration. He contended that the public is worried about the wrong risks in its diet, in part because of exaggerated news accounts of such scares as Alar tn apples, cyanide in grapes and di oxin in mux. Schcuplcin based his conclusions on a statistical analysis of the quan tity of cancer-causing agents in the diet. He said that the risk of dying from cancer from dietary exposure to both natural and manmade carcinogens, or cancer-inducing substances, was 7.7 percent. The risk from naturally oc curring carcinogens alone was 7.6 percent. “Most of the risks arc people’s i personal choices,” Schcuplcin said. > “They arc not imposed on people by corporations. Apparently lhat’sa hard r lesson. People want to blame somc I body.” h Schcuplcin presented his findings -t at a meeting of the American Asso ciauon for the Advancement of Sci ence. Dr. Frank Young, a former FDA " commissioner who is now deputy * assistant secretary of Health and Human Services, said he agreed with Schcuplcin’s contention. ‘ The headline should not be,‘All < j Foods Cause Cancer’or‘Drop Dead. < Don’t Eat,”’ Young said. “The good news is, let us not as a nation focus just on the technological food addi tives. We ought to focus on the big issues as well.” Schcuplein said the clearest can cer-causing agent in ordinary food is fat, which has been linked with sev eral kinds of tumors. However, he said most foods now eaten would not pass safely tests required for new food chemicals and additives. He estimated that carcinogens make up one-tenth of 1 percent of the food people cat. Among concerns he cited were: •Wcll-cookcd, high-protein foods, such as meal and eggs, contain bacte rial substances that can cause genetic mutations. An ordinary day’s protein can be as damaging to the genes as five cigarettes. •Hazardous urethane is a natural product of fermentation. It is present in beer, yogurt, bread and other foods. •Mycotoxins produced by molds arc common in many foods, espe cially when stored in warm, humid conditions. Aflaloxins occur in corn and peanuts, /caralenonc in soybeans diiu ill yciiuw iicc. •Smoked or sailed fish and pick led vegetables may cause digestive cancers. This is attributed to nitrates and funguses. •Grilling and charring fish or meat can produce potentially hazardous substances, such as nitropyrencs. •Many spices contain question able substances. There iscstragolc in tarragon, eugenal in cloves, cinna maldchyde in cinnamon, myristiem in nutmeg and anethole in fennel. Several spices, including oregano, marjoram and bay leaves, may cause genetic damage. •Other naturally occurring carcino gens include d-limonene in oranges, psoralens in celery, hydrazines in mushrooms and nitrates in spinach. “Even a modestly effective at tempt to lessen the dietary risk of natural carcinogens would probably be enormously more useful to human health than regulatory efforts devoted to eliminating traces of pesticide resi dues or other specific trace-level :hcmicals,“ Schcuplein said. Kohl makes peace between ministers BONN, West Germany - Chancel lor Helmut Kohl made peace between his defense and foreign ministers Monday on the NATO role in a united Germany, while Germans exiled from areas now in Poland demanded their homelands back. Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher and the defense minister, Gerhard Stoltenberg, issued a state ment at Kohl’s request saying neither soldiers from the alliance nor West German troops should be stationed in what now is East Germany. Stoltenberg suggested on Friday that NATO defenses be applied to a “whole Germany.” Genscher said the defense minister was “causing unnecessary irritation where a subtle touch was needed.” In East Berlin on Monday, most participants in weekly talks between the government and opposition spoke against NATO membership for a united Germany and said it should be de militarized. As a precondition for reunifica tion, they said, East and West Ger many should issue a joint statement guaranteeing Poland’s borders and giving security assurances to other European countries. About 50,(XX) East Germans who favor a rapid union participated in the weekly rally Monday at Leipzig, a center of the pro-democracy move* ment. Hans Modrow, East Germany’s Communist premier, told opposition leaders he would not go “on his knees’’ for interim aid from West Germany. At meetings with Kohl and other West German officials last week in East Berlin, Modrow asked for 15 billion marks ($9 billion) in “solidar ity aid” to tide his government over until the nation’s free elections on March 18. Bonn refused on grounds that East Germany would not disclose its fi nanc ial condition or accept an offer to make the West German mark the currency of both countries. West Germany did provide the equivalent of about S3.5 billion in aid for proj ects over which East Germany will have little control. Negotiations on economic and currency union begin today in East Berlin, although Modrow’s govern ment has made clear such a step can not be approved before the elections. Dieter Vogel, government spokes man in Bonn, told reporters Kohl summoned Stoltenberg and Genschcr to the chancellery Monday. Thci statement repeated assurances Kot made during talks in Moscow wit Soviet President Mikhail Gorbache> who favors a neutral united German} Genscher and Stoltenberg, wh represent different parties in the gov eming coalition, said no NATO unit or facilities would be extended inti what is now East Germany. They said that included Wes German troops under NATO com mand and those not directly assigns to the alliance, such as territory defense units. Last month, Genscher suggeste what now is West German territor remain part of NATO and the are east of the Elbe River, now Ea.< Germany, be militarily neutral. Stoltenberg’s signature on the joir statement with Genscher effectivcl reversed the position the defens minister took Friday, that NATO troop defend all of united Germany. “The security policy of the are. now comprising East Germany in al its aspects is to be determined will the freely elected government of Eas Germany as well as with the fou powers responsible for Germany’ since World War II, it said. ; Netfraskan 3 Editor Amy Edward* Graphics Editor John Bruce It .. 472-1766 Photo Chief Dave Hansen Managing Editor Ryan Sleeves Night News Editors Jana Pedersen Assoc News Editors Lisa Donovan Diane Brayton It , n Eric Planner Art Director Brian Shelllto Editorial Page Editor Bob Nelson General Manager Dan Shattll Wire Editor Brandon Loomis Production Manager Katherine Pollcky C Copy Desk Editor Darcle Wiegeri Advertising Manager Jon Daehnke 5 Sports Editor Jett Ad#I Sales Manager Kerry Jetfries brailJUnion^144-080) is published by the UNL Publications Board, Ne weekly during summer session? 'NE' M°nd*y mrou0h Friday dunn° ,he academic year; 1 oJwnn7M^irdfled 1° ,ubmil st0fv 'does and comments to the Dally Nebraskan by accessHn the p/6t?i,^.n*eeo9 *_m^and 5 P m Monday through Friday. The public also has 1 ^ub£lStoS^2^ f«2P?afd Fof in,ormat'on. contact Pam Hem. 472-2568. DUDscoption price is $45 for one year • St l?n(£inSMF ,0 the Da"y Nebraskan, Nebraska Union 34, 1400 R St..Lincoln, NE 68588^0448 Second-class postage pa,d at Lincoln, NE _ ALL MATERIAL copyright 1990 DAILY NEBRASKAN