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News Digest Tuesday, March 12,1996 Page 2 Clinton tags GOP efforts as \anti-environmental’ HACKENSACK, N.J. — In a stinging denunciation of Republi can clean-earth policies. President Clinton accused Congress on Mon day of engineering an “anti-envi ronmental campaign” in concert with industrial lobbyists. Making his first election-year address on the environment, Clinton proposed $2 billion in tax breaks for companies that clean up and develop land contaminated by toxic waste. And he promised more vetoes for bills he thinks would undermine the environment. “When it comes to protecting our air, our food, our water, I can not sacrifice America’s values or America’s future,” Clinton told a crowd of 6,000 at Fairleigh Dickinson University. Fighting a bad winter cold, Clinton also traveled to neighbor ing New York City to be honored as Irish America magazine’s “Irish American of the Year.” The presi dent, who heads to Egypt on Tues day for an anti-terrorism summit, also met in Hackensack with fami lies of two American victims of Middle East bombings. In his main address of the day, Clinton called for a bipartisan ap proach to environmental control — a point easily lost in a highly parti san speech. “It is incredible to me now that the environment has, for the first time in a generation, become a source of political division,” the president said. His voice cracking from his cold, Clinton added, “Congress has mounted the most aggressive anti cnvironmcntal campaign in our his tory. And I am proud that we have stood against that.” Poll after poll shows Clinton making strides against Republicans by portraying them as enemies of the environment. Every word and every photo here was designed to capitalize on that. “When it comes to protecting our air; our food, our water, I cannot sacrifice America's values or America's future." BILL CLINTON U.S. President Republicans argue that the En vironmental Protection Agency is a bulky bureaucracy that ovcrrcgu lates. EPA money and rules can be trimmed without hurting the envi ronment, the GOP says. Clinton began the day with a tour of a Superfund site in nearby Wallington, N.J. His motorcade rolled past a sign reading, “Danger: Hazardous Waste” and wound down to the bottom of a bowl shaped field that consists of20,000 tons of snow-covered, PCB-con taminated soil. At the rim of the field stood an elementary school, its students lin ing a security fence and shouting down happily to Clinton. He was told that cleanup work at the abandoned Industrial Latex site stopped last year after Congress imposed a 25 percent cut in the Superfund budget. “We cannot afford to just stop things like this,” Clinton replied. Though the GOP budget in cluded a major cut for Suncrfund projects, so did a makeshift spend ing bill signed by the president this year to reopen the government. The EPA says the budget re straints forced the agency to aban don cleanup work at 60 other toxic waste dump sites across the coun try. Prosecutor says McDougals planned ‘perfect’ crimes LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — As gov ernor, Bill Clinton helped secure a $300,000 business loan for one of his Whitewater partners that she instead put into her personal checking ac count, a federal, prosecutor said Mon day. <c Susan McDougal had told financier David Hale that she was going to use the money for her real estate market ing company, prosecutor Ray Jahn said in his opening statement. Hale later spoke with Clinton at the Capi tol about the loan, Jahn said. Jahn alleged that Mrs. McDougal, her ex-husband, James McDougal and Clinton’s successor. Gov. Jim Guy Tucker, obtained nearly $3 million in illegal loans from Hale in the mid 1980s. “It was the intention of the defen dants to go in, obtain the money, make their profits and sneak the money back,” Jahn said. “This was nearly the perfect crime. Until David Hale came forward in 1993, the crime was un discovered.” Defense attorneys attacked Hale’s credibility and urged jurors not to be lieve him. “He was a fraud from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet,” said Tucker’s lawyer W.H. “Buddy” Sutton. Tucker and the McDougals are ac cused of arranging sales of real estate at inflated prices to funnel extra money into Hale’s Capital Manage ment Services Inc., a Small Business Administration-backed lender. McDougal faces 19 charges. Tucker 11 and Mrs. McDougal eight. Jahn said everything about the loans appeared proper, but that be cause of plotting to overvalue prop erty and determining who would get loans, the three broke the law, Jahn said. “The fraud was in the lies told and the truth concealed,” he said. During a break in Jahn’s statement, Tucker said he didn’t recall the events the same way as prosecutors. IvlcDougal defense attorney Sam Heuer said “That meeting between Hale and Clinton at the Capitol never, ever, ever took place.” Clinton has called Hale’s claims “a bunch of bull.” Clinton is expected to testify in person, via videotape or by satellite for the defense, probably sometime in early April. Neither Clinton nor first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton arc charged in the case. During their opening statements, lawyers for the governor and McDougal criticized Hale as a man seeking reduced penalties for his own crimes — a pair of felony fraud charges to which he pleaded guilty two years ago this month. Madison Guaranty “has been looked at by more examiners than any other institution in the United States,” Heuer said. “Nobody but the Office of the Independent Counsel, based on David Hale’s story, has found these charges to exist.” — * ■ ■ Taiwan goes on alert as live fire begins TAIPEI, Taiwan — While China growled, Taiwan welcomed U.S. war ships under orders toiffcad toward the troubled region on the eve of Chinese live-fire war games. Taiwan went on heightened alert Tuesday as the Chinese military exer cises were scheduled to begin off the island’s coast. China is starting eight days of air and sea maneuvers in a 6,600-square mile zone which stretches to the mid point of the Taiwan Strait — an unof ficial border both sides try not to cross. U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher said the U.S. ships were meant to be “in a position to be help ful if they need to be.” Taiwanese government spokesman Jason Hu said the American vessels were intended “to maintain peace, and not to intervene” in the dispute. The military has said that judging from Chinese military movements in recent weeks, the exercise will include anti-submarine maneuvers, anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles, artillery and bombing runs. “We have heightened alert, espe cially on the frontline islands which lie face to face with the exercise area,” a military official, requesting anonym ity, said Tuesday. Taiwan was jittery Monday as shareholders bailed out of Taiwanese stocks and the public rushed to buy millions of American dollars as a hedge against a possible conflict. “Taiwan is a part of China and not a protectorate of the United States,” warned Chinese Foreign Minister Qian Qichen, after the United States moved one aircraft carrier battle group nearer Taiwan and ordered a second to quit the Persian Gulf early and head toward the region. Reflecting his government’s insis tence that China’s moves arc a threat to the prosperous region, not just to Taiwan, Hu said: “We believe this is welcomed by countries in the region. We are not hoping for war, so any acts conducive to peace will be welcome.” U.S. Secretary of Defense William J. Perry said he did not think Beijing will invade the island, and predicted a non-military solution to the crisis. China regards Taiwan as a renegade province. The Nationalists retreated to the island in 1949 after losing a civil war on the mainland to the Commu nists. Both Taipei and Beijing formally have espoused reunification, but China is convinced Taiwanese President lie Teng-hui covertly wants indepen dence. Qian told reporters in Beijing that China still hoped to achieve reunifi cation peacefully, but reiterated that Beijing would not renounce the use of force. “If foreign forces invade Taiwan or the Taiwan authorities attempt to go in for Taiwan independence, we will not sit idly by,” he warned. Following the three missiles it test fired near Taiwan on Friday, China is starting eight days of air and sea ma neuvers in a 6,600-square-mi lc rect angle that stretches to the mid-point of the Taiwan Straits — an unofficial * border both sides try not to cross. While any serious miscalculation could spark hostilities, there are also indications that neither side is eager for war. China has orchestrated its moves carefully. Friday’s test missiles splashed harmlessly into the sea and were thought to carry dummy war heads. Airplanes and ships have been warned to avoid the war games zone, but their routes will not be seriously disrupted. Taiwan’s military said the exercise appeared similar to one last August, and added that Taiwanese had “no need to overreact.” Stray dogs keep boy alive in woods, parents give new home to ‘angels’ SPRINGFIELD, Mo. —Two dogs led a boy to the brink of death, then saved his life. Now they are going to get a new home. Josh Carlisle, a 10-year-old with Down syndrome, was playing in his yard when a couple of wandering dogs apparently caught his eye and he fol lowed them into the rugged, wooded Ozarks near his home. For three days, as temperatures dipped into single digits, up to 350 volunteers searched for the boy. On Saturday, a man on horseback heard barking and found Josh in the company of the two protective dogs. “The dogs took him in as if they were his mother,” Sheriff Ralph Hendrix said Monday. “They probably curled up next to him and kept him warm, warm enough to stay alive on us.” The dogs arc “God’s angels,” said Josh’s stepfather, Lynn Coffey. He and Josh’s mother, Johnny Coffey, planned to give the strays a new home for keeping the boy alive. The smaller of the dogs, a dachs hund, followed rescuer Oscar “Junior” Nell and his horse through rough ter rain as they carried the cold little boy to help. The dog tried to keep up when a police car rushed Josh to a medical helicopter, but his tired legs gave out. Nell gave him a cheesc-and-bolo gna sandwich. “He stayed with us through thick and thin,” Nell said. The second dog, described by the sheriff as a heeler, a type of dog used to herd livestock, was found Sunday afternoon by Josh’s next-door neigh bors. Tony Thomas saw the dog on a hill near their house and put food out to lure it closer. “It was just a real timid dog,” his wife, Julia, said Monday. “It wouldn’t cat unless wc left it alone.” Both dogs will remain with the sheriff’s department until Josh comes home from Cox Medical Center South in Springfield. The boy was in fair condition with frostbitten toes. Springfield businessman Tom Seabaugh had offered a $100 reward for each dog brought to Josh: “Wc want to have a ceremony. “We just feel like those little guys need to be rewarded.” President’s Middle East visit prelude to Israeli peace pact WASHINGTON — President Clinton’s trip to the Middle East is the first step toward a strategic anti-ter rorism and intelligence agreement between the United States and Israel, one designed to bolster Israel’s capac ity to make peace securely, diplomatic sources said Monday. The agreement, now in preparation, would be announced in April during a visit to Washington by Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres. One intended purpose is to enhance Peres’ prospects for winning election May 29 against the Likud opposition. Clinton goes to Israel after partici pating Wednesday in the “Summit of the Peacemakers” at Sharm cl-Sheik, the Israeli-built resort on Egypt’s Red Sea coast. “Leaders from the Middle East and around the world will stand as one for peace in the Middle East, together to combat the merchants of hatred with every means at our command,” Clinton said Monday night in New York. Accepting an award for his work in Northern Ireland, the president added: “We must not let the terrorists in the Middle East have the victory they seek — the death of every hope for peace.” Clinton plans to leave Secretary of State Warren Christopher behind in Jerusalem, and that stopover will re sult in a formal counterterrorism agreement, providing for shared intel ligence information and counterterrorism expertise and equip ment. CIA Director John Deutch is ac companying the president to the sum mit, and will contribute to finalizing the accord. The larger strategic agree ment, which stops short of a formal defense treaty, will include counterterrorism provisions and oth ers still under consideration, said the diplomatic sources, speaking on con dition of anonymity. An administra tion source confirmed the account. The agreement to be announced in Israel will embellish this help, provid ing for a continuing cooperation ar rangement. It and the security accord due in April are designed to flesh out Clinton’s promise fo stand by Israel as it takes risk for peace. Editor J. Christopher Hein 472-1766 Managing Editor Doug Kouma Assoc. News Editors Matt Waite Sarah Sea let Opinion Page Editor Doug Peters Wire Editor Michelle Gamer Copy Desk Editor Tim Pearson Sports Editor Mitch Sherman Arts & Entertainment Editor Jeff Randall Photo Director Staci McKee Night News Editors Rebecca Oltmans Melanie Branded Anne Hjersman Beth Narans Art Director Aaron Steckelberg General Manager Dan Shattil Production Manager Katherine PoHcky Advertising Manager Amy Struthers Asst. Advertising Mgr. Laura Wilson http://www.unl.edu/DallyNeb/ FAX NUMBER 472-1761 The Daily NebraskanlUSPS 144-080) is published by the UNL Publications Board. Nebraska Union 34.1400 R St.. Lincoln, NE 68588-0448, Monday through Friday during the academic year; weekly during summer sessions. 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