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News Digest • PAGE 2 __WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 80,1996 r low Less than 55 percent of Americans expected to mark the “X* on the ballot this year. WASHINGTON (AP)—The elec tion is almost upon the country and about all that remains is to browbeat the American people for the next six days to shame them into voting. ' Won’t work. The experts say less than 55 percent of eligible Americans will participate, and they have some theories on what that says about the world’s most celebrated—and maybe its most casual—democracy. A century ago, 80 percent of Ameri cans routinely voted. But in the last 30 years, turnout has gone down. From 64 percent in 1960, when John F. Kennedy was elected, it slid to just barely above 50 percent in 1988 before squiggling up to 55.2 percent four years ago. But the ,1992 race had an incum bent president on the ropes, an attrac tive Challenger and a feisty third-party - insurgent. This time around, none of those elements apply and that has a lot of people worried that the participants will barely outnumber nonvoters. If people in only nine states got to elect the president next Tuesday, those in the other 41 would be outraged. But that’s what will happen, in ef fect. The number who will vote is roughly equal to all the voters in the nine largest states, California, New York, Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, Michigan and New Jer sey. “There seems little question that turnout will be down, perhaps sharply,” says Curtis Gans, who has been think ing about voter turnout for 20 years. He directs the nonpartisan Committee for the Study of the American Elector ate. Things would even be worse if Congress hadn’t enacted the motor voter law, allowing people to register where they apply for drivers licenses and in other accessible places. That law registered between six million and nine million new voters this year. Still, Gans predicts that turnout on Tuesday will range between the 50.1 percent participation in 1988 —t the record low in modem times - and the 55.2 percent rate in 1992. Compare that to a century ago. In 1896, when Democrat William Jennings Bryan ran against Republican William McKinley, 79percent turned out—including an astonishing 96 per cent in Iowa and Illinois. In those days, the parties differed sharply; now they often gloss over dif ferences. Believing their well-being was at stake, whole classes of people associated with a party. “Parties don't do mobilizing any more,” says Walter Dean Burnham, voting expert at the University of Texas. “The Republicans don’t mobi lize the lower orders,” he said, and the party that traditionally played that role, the Democrats, “became yuppiefied, gone upscale.” What worries Gans most is the ten dency of young people to shun voting. Only 12 percent of those 18 to 20 voted in 1994, he says, and a majority of their parents don’t vote either. Voting matters, Gans says, because it is about the least one can do to par ticipate in democracy. People who don’t vote, he says, generally don’t vol unteer, don’t write letters to the editor, don’t,organize — and that’s not good for a society that depends on citizen action. This week, all the candidates are appealing to voters to vote. Churches, editorials, civic groups beat the same drum. Historically, the problem hasn’t been getting registered people to the polls, but getting people to register. In an Associated Press poll, 83 per cent of registered voters said they were “absolutely certain” to vote. On a purely mathematical basis, it is hard to make the case for voting, notes Patrick Stroh, an analyst with a political consulting firm in Pittsburgh. One vote in millions is rarely pivotal. And studies show that nonvoters, if they did participate, would break about the same way as the voters. “It is unclear that if we had a 98 percent turnout it would revolutionize anything,” Stroh said. But another ob server, Jane Mansbridge of Harvard, says people who don’t vote pay; they don’t get as good representation. Analyst says younger people less concerned about voting From The Associated Press Tucked between music videos and episodes of Beavis and Butthead on MTV, young voters are being told about this year’s presi dential election. But are they listening? Regardless of how the message is packaged, Melanie Weatherly says she won’t be altering a voting booth next week. “A lot of the candidates are old, pompous white males who give a lot of lip service,” Weatherly said. “I don’t feel like they represent America. The 24-year-old psychology stu dent has voted once since 1989, when siie became eligible to vote. She represents many young voters nationwide who plan to stay away from the polls next Ihesday. Curtis Gans, a Washington, D.C., political analyst who has stud ied voting patterns for 20 years, said apathy isn’t the cause of the voting resistance. “What makes them vote is a sense of hope in the future, a sense of mission in the election, a sense of idealism in the election,” Gans said. “That’s not very evidentin this election.” Most young voters won’t fell for gimmicks intended to get them to vote, said Gans, director of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate. “People don’t vote because rock stars tell them to vote,” Gans said, referring to MTV’s “Choose or Lose”campaign that uses celebrities to encourage young Americans to take advantage of their right to vote. Most people will not vote until they think they have a greater stake in the process, Gans said. When people marry, have children and begin paying property taxes, they usually pay more attention to elec tions, he said. “We know that it isn’t simply a Generation X’ phenomenon,” said John Hibbing, a professor of politi cal science at the University of Ne braska-Lincoln. “Young people have never voted much.” Erica Rea, a senior at Lincoln Northeast High School, said she plans to vote next Tuesday for the first time. She said she doesn’t iden tify strongly with either major party presidential candidate, but doesn’t want to miss her first vote. Clinton confident as s? | COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Showing a front-runner’s cockiness as Election Day nears, President Clinton brushed off noisy hecklers from Bob Dole’s camp Tuesday by declaring, “I’ll bet you they won’t be doing that a week from now.” Ending a seven-state tour before beginning a nonstop dash to Nov. 5, Ginton campaigned in Ohio and Pennsylvania in an effort to pad his commanding lead in national polls and help in the Democrats’ struggle to reclaim control of Congress. “Will you be there next week?” he shouted to thousands of support ers on a sunny fall day on Hill Field ‘ at the Univarsity of Pennsylvania. “God bless you, we can do it!” In Columbus, a dozen or more protesters shouted persistently from choice seats above the stage in Ohio State University’s basketball arena. • They waved signs, chanted “Dole Kemp” and shouted, “Stop lying to ' . _ y: the American public.” The president tried to hush them, tried to ignore them and finally lashed back by attacking spending reductions proposed in Republican budgets that he vetoed. “I would be screaming too if I were in a country that took Head Start and Big Bird away from 5 year-olds, school lunches away from 10-year-olds, summer jobs away from 15-year-olds and college loans away from 20-year-olds. I might be screaming too.” The crowd roared approval. “We got some juice in the audi ence,” Clinton said afterward. ‘That was great.” Indeed, there is a buoyant, con fident mood among the president's people as the race moves toward the finish line. Campaign crowds are large and enthusiastic. Despite long days on the road, Clinton's aides are relaxed. Dole remains optimistic IRVINE, Galif. (AP)^ Bob Dole ended a four-day California swing and headed East on Tuesday after a blis tering attack on President Clinton’s foreign Mid economic policies. “The Clinton administration is more like a wrecking crew than a bridge builder,” Dole told a breakfast gathering in Orange County, normally one of the most Republican areas in the nation. He asserted that a win in Califor nia would make capturing the presi dency a “piece of cake” and said he’d be back this weekend pursuing that goal. Combing the country for a come back in the meantime, Dole’s strategists were setting his schedule day by day, even hour by hour, as the campaign entered its final week. It was not an easy task for Dole, trailing by 15 to 20 percentage points in most national polls. “Maybe they’re accurate, maybe thley’re not,” Dole said. “Our own polls show there’s a lot happening out there. A lot of undecideds.... People are still making up their minds.” Dole renewed his assertion he would wrest California — and its 54 electoral votes—from Clinton, start ing with a big win in Orange County, a GOP bastion. “We are fighting for California, for every vote, up and down, all over this place,” he said. “Coining back on Sat urday or Sunday. We understand the importance of this state.” A poll in Tuesday’s Los Angeles Times found Clinton leading Dole 51 percent to 34 percent in California, with 12 percent for Ross Perot. Furthermore, an Oct. 19-21 survey released over the weekend by the same newspaper found Dole carrying Or ange County by between 19,000 and 25,000 voters — far below the, 300,000-vote margin typically needed to offset the heavily Democratic bal loting in San Francisco and Los Ange les. Correction The Daily Nebraskan listed the wrong date for completion of the parking structure near Memorial Stadium. It will be finished in August 1997. Clarification Husker fans whocannot find a retailer sponsoring the Windsor Canadian con i test described in Friday’s Daily Ne * braskan can write for an application and rules to “Windsor Greatest Sports Fan Contest,” c/o Shandwick USA, 8400 Normandale Lake Blvd. Suite 500, Minneapolis, Minn., 55437. Yeltsin may have surgery next week Doctor says president’s conditions improving, prognosis kxks good MOSCOW (AP)—Boris Yeltsin’s condition is improving, and the Rus sian president could undergo heart sur gery as early as next week, an Ameri can surgeon consulting on the case said Tuesday. Dr. Michael DeBakey told The Associated Press that he would travel to Russia this weekend to consult with Yeltsin’s doctors. No date has been set, but “we hope to go ahead with it next week,” DeBakey said from Houston. He saH^yeltsm’s condition has been improving, and that doctors had made progress in treating Yeltsin’s severe anemia and thyroid dysfunction. Those problems, he said, appear to have been “pretty well corrected.” DeBakey said Yeltsin needed a triple or quadruple coronary artery bypass, although he would not know specifically what the Russian doctors plan to do until he arrives in Moscow. The date of the operation has been a moving target, with Yeltsin at first sayinghe expected surgery in Septem ber. 'Hie Kremlin later said it would take place sometime between mid-No vember and mid-December. DeBakeyhas said several times that the prognosis for the 65-year-old Rus sian leader is good. There was no comment from the Kremlin about DeBakey’s assessment. Kremlin doctors said earlier Tuesday .that the “final stage of preparations” , for surgery had begun. Their statement, carried by Russian hews agencies, said Yeltsin’s condition was satisfactory. It did not mention a date for the opera tion. The Kremlin, which has been less than forthcoming about Yeltsin’s health, chose instead to emphasize the fact that the president spoke on the phone with his chief of staff. It wasn’t much to work with, but the president’s men were relentless in their campaign to burnish Yeltsin’s image as a can-do kind of guy despite his illness. ‘He has his own vision of the prob lem, his own understanding of his body,” Dr. Sergei Mironov said. “So if we change his treatment in any way, or use a new medicine, we first have to convince him that it’s necessary.” Yeltsin scrapped all meetings this week to undergo medical tests, but his staff Tuesday made it sound as if he were working nonstop. He gets “reports every day and works on documents from 11/2 to two hours,” Mironov said in die interview. Nebraskan Assoc. News Edttors: Paula Lavigne * Jeff Randall Opinion Editor: Anne Hjersman AP Wire Editor: Kely Johnson Copy Desk Chief: Julie Sobczyk Sports Edtor: Mitch Sherman A&E Editor: Joshua Gillin Photo Director: Tanna Kinnaman Web Editor: Michelle Collins Night Editor: Beth Narans Layout Editor: Nancy Zywiec Night News Editors: Bryce Glenn Jennifer Milke Antone Oseka Art Director: Aaron Steckelberg General Manager: Dan Shattil Advertising Manager: AmyStmthers Asst Advert!aing Manager: Tracy Welshans Classified Ad Manager Tiffiny Clifton Publications Board Chairman: Travis Brandt Professional Adviser Don Walton 473-7301 FAX NUMBER: 472-1761 The Daily Nebraskan (USPS144-080) is published by the UNL Publications Board. Nebraska Union 34.1400 R St., Lincoln. NE 686884)448^Monday through Friday during the academic year; weekly during summer sessions. Readers are encouraged to submit story ideas and comments tothe Daily Ne braskan by calling 472-2588. The public has access to the Publications Board. Subscription price is $55 for one year. Postmaster: Send address changes to the Daily Nebraskan. Nebraska Union 34, 1400 R St., Lincoln. NE 68588-0448. Second-class postage paid at Lincoln. Neb. ALL MATERIAL COPYRIGHT 1996 DAILY NEBRASKAN When putting out a campfire, drown the fire, stir it, and drown it again.