8- The Michigan Daily - Thursday, February 2, 1995AN/W O Taxpayers picked up tab for Gingrich's trips to class. WASHINGTON (AP)-Newt Gingrich didn't receive a dime to teach a history course at a Geor- gia college in 1993, but government records show taxpayers picked up most of the tab to fly him there. The records, compiled by the office of the House clerk, show Gingrich used 10 of his 29 taxpayer-paid trips in 1993 to travel to or from Atlanta on the 10 weekends he taught his course at Kennesaw State College. The trips occurred on consecutive weeks, the only period during the year that he traveled home so regularly. Members of Congress are reimbursed for flights home as long as they claim official business as the primary purpose of the trip. Meetings with con- stituents and speeches to community groups are examples of official business, but teaching a course is not. In Gingrich's case, a spokesman said, constitu- ent meetings were set up to coincide with the weekly trips to the classroom. "He made a commitment to be here for the course, so he built town-hall meetings into the schedule," said Allan Lipsett, the spokesman in Gingrich's district office in Marietta, Ga. "That's what a congressman's supposed to do: come home and be with your constituents." Chuck Lewis, of the Washington-based Center for Public Integrity, criticized the travel payments. "Public officials are not supposed to conduct private business on the public nickel," Lewis said. "And they're not supposed to create the facade of official business to cover their costs." He said such mingling of official business and private business is routine in Washington. Gingrich taught for two hours on 10 straight Saturdays, starting on Sept. 18, 1993. During that period, he filed expense accounts for four round- trip flights between Washington and Atlanta. He also claimed six one-way flights, either to Atlanta before the class or to Washington after the class. The flights cost $2,845, according to the House records. The bill for Gingrich's government-re- lated travel for all of 1993, the last year for which complete records are available, was $8,435. Taxpayers did not pay for three other one-way trips. Gingrich's financial disclosure statement for 1993 shows that one trip to Atlanta before a class and two trips that ended in Washington after classes were paid by congressional candidates who invited him to campaign for them. Lipsett said Gingrich keeps a busy schedule each time he flies to Atlanta to teach. "He gets in on Friday evening, teaches the class on Saturday morning, does a town hall meeting on Saturday afternoon," the spokesman said. Often, he added, there is a dinner or speech Saturday night, and sometimes an event on Sunday. "All this while teaching a course he wasn't paid anything for," Lipsett said. Gingrich originally was offered $5,000 to teach the course, but he agreed to teach for free since elected officials are prohibited from being paid by state colleges and universities in Georgia. He now teaches the course at a private college, and it is broadcast nationally on cable television. Questions about the course are the focus of a complaint against Gingrich before the House eth- ics committee. The Associated Press reported this week that Gingrich was offered the course by Kennesaw's business dean after the congressman helped the dean's private consulting firm set up a meeting to seek contracts from a governmentagency. The firm did not win any contracts. AP PHOTO House Speaker Newt Gingrich gestures at a news conference yesterday. Chechen leader charged with treason; Russia renews attack The Washington Post a mostly Muslim region 1,000 miles MOSCOW -Russia charged the south of Moscow, on Dec. 11, and leader of the breakaway region of they launched their assault on Grozny Chechnya with treason yesterday as one month ago. Despite repeated Russian troops intensified their as- claims of victory or imminent vic- sault on its capital, Grozny, and small tory, the Russian army remains towns in the countryside. bogged down in Grozny and faces The federal prosecutor's office increasing resistance elsewhere in issued a warrant for the arrest of Chechnya. Dzhokhar Dudayev, more than three Artillery and mortar shells again years after he declared independence for his Connecticut-sized region on Rhhave Russia's southern border. 1U6J' w iOi The charge carries a possible a us - but death sentence, but Dudayevn has a so far proven resourceful at elud- not lietA t By ing Russian attempts to hunt him down.a In Chechnya, the Russians launched a fierce attack by artillery law are they and helicopter gunship on the town of . . Samashky, where Chechen fighters wiping out earlier had shot at a Russian tank pe au m n~e 'aff column. The apparent revenge attack on - Malsak Lomangabetyev Samashky, where thousands of women and children from Grozny had taken refuge, leveled houses and caused numerous civilian casualties, rained down on Chechen-held areas residents told reporters after the fight- of Grozny yesterday, but there was ing. little evidence of Russian progress Atleast18peoplewerekilleddur- in evicting Chechen fighters from ing the five-hour assault 20 miles the city. west of Grozny, the Reuter news Much of the capital, once home agency reported, most of them women to 400,000 people, has been de- and children. stroyed, and international humani- "They have shot at us before, but tarian officials have said that tens of not like that," said Malsak thousands of civilians are now Lomangabetyev. "By what interna- trapped in cellars without food, tional law are they wiping out peace- water or electricity. ful villages?" Russian planes also bombed vil- Russian troops entered Chechnya, lages in the mountains south of Grozny ora e ®'% * va s e a rs e a " , e ~ f *r f " g r DOCTORAL DEGREE PLUS * ASSESSMENT EXPERIENCE3 4 f Competitive 3-year internship in Measurement & Quantitative Methods 4 at Michigan State University. 20 hours per week at field site, including 0 0 summer, plus course-work & dissertation in ineasurement/evaluation or 0 research design/statistics with nationally recognized faculty. STIPEND: $12,500 + 16 free credits annually and in-state tuition. 4 4 QUALIFICATIONS: BA in math, psychology, education or related field. 4 Proficiency in English. Educational experience desirable. o DEADLINE: FEBRUARY 15,1995 S Y d s s r n r yesterday. Defense Minister Pavel Grachev, the target of much criticism for the results of the operation, was reported yesterday to have checked into a hospital two days ago. Another key figure in the mili- tary operation, Deputy Prime Min- ister Nikolai Yegorov, checked into a hospital shortly before President Boris Yeltsin relieved him of his duties as presidential representa- tive to the region. But a Defense Ministry spokeswoman said yes- terday that Grachev was in the sub- urban Moscow hospital for "rou- tine checks." Yeltsin turned 64 yesterday but, with his popularity falling to new lows, did not mark the birthday with any public celebration. The chief prosecutor's office said in a statement that Dudayev, the Chechen leader, has been charged now because "enough evidence has been gathered" to accuse him of "commit- ting deliberate actions to seize power ... and instigate ethnic, social and religious strife." Russian officials suggested yes- terday, as they have several times before, that Dudayev has abandoned Chechnya. But the former Soviet air force bomber pilot and general has disappeared and then popped up in- side Chechnya for impromptu news conferences or interviews several times during the war, mocking Rus- sian intelligence-gathering and threatening to bring the war to Rus- sian cities if Yeltsin does not cease fire. I I. AP oTo An unidentified man scans the headlines at a Mexico City newsstand yesterday. Mexicans cheer Citon's loan , pledge; peso g-rains some value S S S 1 E V y. * Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo personally blamed for economic turmoil Los Angeles Times MEXICO CITY - The headlines proclaimed, "Long Live Clinton!" and "Clinton to the Rescue!" The peso soared, interest rates fell overnight and, beaming with relief, Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo managed his first genuine smile in public after weeks of crisis. But, on the morning after Presi- dent Clinton's $20 billion bailout buoyed Mexico's financial markets and bolstered its currency, the nation and its president yesterday remained deeply mired in crises both political and economic. Mexico's increasingly indepen- dent Congress grilled the Zedillo ad- f WRITE OR CALL: DR. S.E. PMIPS, MQM INTERNSHIP COORDINATOR Phone: (517) 355-5S38 'D FAX: (51)3534393 U. *U& **0& Ab@& 3 & h@& U . t, THURSDAY NO COVER AT RESTAURANT L0 SPORTS SAR Also featuring: 200 a wing $3.2 pitchers Coors Light $5.00 pitchers Long Island Ice Tea ministration on its future monetary policy. And the legislators angrily debated opposition calls for an ex- traordinary session to demand that the president and his economic team disclose the precise terms of a U.S.- led international credit package to- taling $50.76 billion - and what, if any, concessions Zedillo made to win it. Under domestic and international pressure, Zedillo's Central Bank Gov- ernor promised to announce the nation's current foreign-exchange reserves, which had already fallen from $10 billion tojust over $5 billion during Zedillo's first month in office in December. Fueled by continuing insecurity, interest rates remained out of reach of most Mexicans - topping 45 percent for most loans. The peso steadied after early gains yesterday, closing at 5.4 to the dollar- still about 30 percent lower than when Zedillo took office two months ago. The Mexican stock market fell more than 4 percent. And prices for most goods were still going up. Mexico's political and economic analysts were almost unanimous in concluding that Clinton's rescue plan is little more than a Band-Aid on a continuing hemorrhage of confidence in Zedillo's ability to get Mexico out of its morass. "The uncertainty is not over," declared political analyst Carlos Ramirez. "What began as a crisis of confidence and credibility quickly led to a crisis of capability and, this week, entered a crisis of gover- nance." "The crisis hasn't ended," agreed economic analyst Enrique Quintana. "The work that is left to do in the next weeks and months is to rebuild confi- dence to avoid another liquidity crisis in the future. "But the crisis is not liquidity -at least not solely. ... Resolving the li- quidity crisis will simply buy time to resolve the more profound crisis that afflicts the country: the institutional * crisis." The root of Mexico's ills, the ana- lysts said, is Zedillo himself. Uncer- tainty persists about his ability to craft new democratic institutions and si- multaneously build a strong enough presidential image to win back the confidence of international inves- tors, the Mexican people and even some members of his own ruling party. Zedillo, who has vowed to sepa- rate the Mexican presidency from the ruling party for the first time in nearly seven decades, appeared to concede that the absence of confidence was behind the economy's six-week tail- spin. "The foreign investors who had been investing for several years in financial instruments issued by pub- * lic and private institutions in Mexico felt their confidence in our economy's short-term prospects undermined, especially as a result of political events," the president told members of a North American environmental institute in the after- math of Tuesday's bailout. Proclaiming the "structural sound- ness" of the Mexican economy as a whole, Zedillo promised to maintain strict fiscal and monetary discipline and to continue promoting private investment. Answering opposition charges that the new U.S. loan package is attached to strings that dictate policy on migration and narcotics, Zedillo insisted, "These are strictly financial operations that in no way place the country's sovereignty at* risk." In celebration of U-M's ongoing commitment to public service, including 25 years of sponsoring the Public Service Intern Program (PSIP), CP&P invites you to attend a feature presentation by... As part of... Gnrer Pnthwavs in Political Science 1220 South University 21 and over after 9pm 665-7777 FRESHPESONS AND SOPHOMORES SCHOOL CAN'T TEACH YOU EVERYTHING. comTmmtir U ruir-Al l vnVV 0 A U U 215 S. State St. .1