r 'crag *rnW Weather Tonight: Cloudy, chance of rain, low around 450 Tomorrow: Showers likely, high around 62'. One hundredfive years of editornralfreedom Thursday October 26, 1995. W n PE V az f-- ill ;;i !!!!0 C II I 1 W.~ JoycelynElders Resume: 8 Pediatric endocrinologist' * First black surgeon general 0 Resigned from the post last fall * Directed 6,000-member corps of doctors, nurses, pharmacists and scientists Entered U.S. Army as a first lieutenant at age 18 * Currently teaches at the University of Arkansas Medcal School Quotable: At her Senate confirmation hearings, Elders said: "I want to change the way we think about health by putting prevention first. I want to be the voice and vision of the poor and powerless. I want to change concern about problems that affect health into commitment. I would like to make every child born in America a wanted child." Elders to keynote MLK Day '96 By Zachary M. Raimi Daily Staff Reporter Members of the Martin Luther King Day planning committee announced yesterday that Dr. Joycelyn Elders, the last surgeon general, will be the key- note speaker of the University's sym- posium in January. "We thought she would be an excel- lent speaker because of her outspoken- ness regarding causes she believes in, including the health care arena," said Michael Jones-Coleman, coordinator for MLK Day. The committee will also plan at least two panels for the day, and many of the University's departments will sponsor events on the day and throughout the month of January. This year's theme is "Affirmation Through Action: The Challenge Con- tinues." The committee - comprised of about 20 students, staffmembers and faculty- selected Elders from a list that included novelist Toni Morrison, Harvard Prof. Cornel West and poet Maya Angelou. Loren McGhee, president of the cam- pus branch of the National Association of Colored People, said that Elders was a good choice. "I totally agree. I think everyone has the right to speak on what they believe," she said. But campus conservatives object to the selection. LSA senior Mark Fletcher, the College Republicans' state chair, was strongly opposed to the choice. "I think it was an incredibly poor choice," Fletcher said. "Most Ameri- cans respect Dr. King because he en- dorsed individual initiative and per- sonal responsibility-two things which are antithetical topositions Dr. Elders has taken in the present and the past." Jones-Coleman said he is not con- cerned about the controversial air that has surrounded Elders since she began her term as surgeon general. "To date, I haven't heard of anyone who's got a problem with her serving as speaker," he said. "Dr. Elders continues, to this day, to speak out on causes she believes in. Cer- tainly those who didn't support Dr. King's message couldn't say he didn't speak out on causeshe believed in," Jones-Coleman said, adding that Elders would tailor her speech to the theme. The committee is meeting tomorrow to plan more events. Jones-Coleman said that Sunday, Jan. 14, the Boys Choir of Harlem will perform with the University Musical Society. "They are extremely popular with individuals in the greater Ann Arbor communities," Jones-Coleman said. Grammy-nominated gospel singer Yolanda Adams is also scheduled to perform. Two years ago, the Black Student Union boycotted the University's MLK Day events to hold its own teach-ins. At the time, the organization said that the University was getting away from the activism that the day was founded in, and student input was lacking. Last year, the University incorporated the views of the BSU and other student groups, and has done the same this year. Jones-Coleman praised the committee's efforts. "It's a good group. All the feedback from our September meeting was very positive," he said. Several student groups are repre- sented on this year's committee, Jones- Coleman said, including the Native American Student Association, Alianza and the Black Law Student Alliance. Elders Lecturer remembers WWII hero Walienberg Former Swedish ambassador Per Anger delivers sixth annual Wallenberg Lecture By Jeff Eldridge Daily Staff Reporter "He was courageous," said Per Anger, a former Swedish diplomat. "What's more, he was an idealist and a very warm human being." - To a crowd of about 500, Anger spoke last night about his friend Raoul Wallenberg - a University alum whose disappearance remains one of the Cold War's greatest mysteries. Wallenberg, who would be 83 if he is still alive, graduated from the University's School of Architecture in 1935, before serving in a central European trading company and working as a diplomat for Sweden. In the sixth annual Wallenberg Lecture sponsored by the University Wallenberg Endowment, Anger spoke to an audience at Rackham Auditorium about Wallenberg's work saving thousands of Budapest's Jews from Nazi extermination and his eventual disap- pearance in the Soviet Union. Wallenberg led a group of Swedish diplomats in granting Jews travelingpasses to safe countries. "He was very active personally," Anger said. "He would go to railways stations to stop trains to Auschwitz. Of course, he bluffed his way through the situations." Anger, who served with Wallenberg in 1942-45, described an incident when Wallenberg saved a group of Jewish youths. "He always invented a new way of saving people," Anger said. "He was standing around 50 Jewish stu- dents about to be taken by Germans." Immediately, Wallenberg distributed Swedish passes to the group and helped them get to a safe house. "We took away those people who they were going to deport to Auschwitz," Anger said. Anger said the Nazis tacitly allowed the Swedish effort tooccur, in order to avoid diplomatic tension with the neutral country. Nonetheless, at least one unsuccessful assassination attempt was made on Wallenberg, whose eventual disappearance came not at the hands of the Germans but of the Soviets occupying Hungary at the end of World War 11. "The KGB officers who were there knew we had a contact in Stockholm who was an American officer," Anger said, "but who was also an OSS man, a CIA agent. We didn't know that last part, but of course the Soviets knew." Wallenberg was taken in 1945 by the Soviets, who reported that he died of a heart attack in 1947. Anger - and many other experts on the Wallenberg disap- pearance - are highly skeptical of the account. Congress opens debate on GOP budget package Los Angeles Times WASHINGTON - Facing a new veto threat by President Clinton, Con- gress yesterday opened a historic de- bate on the Republican majority's revo- lutionary agenda to curb federaloutlays and reverse three decades of deficit spending. The far-reaching plan, if implemented, is supposed to deliver by the year 2002 a balanced budget for the first time since 1969. "I've been waiting 40 years for this ... defining moment," said Senate Ma- jority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.). House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R- Ga.), characterized the debate and up- coming votes on the giant budget bill - set for today in the House and tomor- row in the Senate - as an "extraordi- nary 48 hours" that amounted to change "on the same scale of the Great Soci- ety." Rolled into the giant budget bill are provisions to dramatically scale back the growth of Medicare, Medicaid, welfare and a host of other assistance programs. The bill also incorporates tax cuts that have already been ap- proved separately by the House and Senate. Unable to derail the GOPjuggernaut, outnumbered but energized Democrats pressed their campaign of resistance in the court of public opinion, attacking Republicans for effecting unprec- edented changes in Medicare, Medic- aid, welfare and other social programs without adequate public scrutiny or debate while at the same time providing a $245 billion tax cut for the well-to-do. "This is a tragic day and an historic day. But I think it is a day the Republi- cans will regret ...," said Senate Minor- ity LeaderTom Daschle (D-S.D.), re- ferring to the 1996 elections. Daschle said the GOP's plan to cut $482 billion from the projected seven- year growth in spending for Medicare and Medicaid amounted to "the biggest rollback of health benefits this country has experienced in its history." President Clinton yesterday renewed his intention to veto the measure, say- ing that the GOP's "misguided budget priorities" were "the wrong way to go, and I don't intend to let it happen." At a White House news conference, Clinton described the Republican bud- get as "extreme" and said it "absolutely shreds our values...." Amendment. would loan levels By Ronnie Glassberg Daily Staff Reporter Two Senate Democrats plan to in- troduce an amendment today to the budget reconciliation bill that would maintain current student loan pro- grams. The amendment, which will be of- fered by Democratic Sens. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts and Paul Simon of Illinois, would cut $2 to $3 billion from student loan programs over the next seven years, compared> to more than $10 billion in the plan passed late last month by the Senate Labor and Human Resources Com- mittee. The Senate is expected to vote to- morrow or Saturday on the bill, which - in addition to student loans - includes changes to Medicare, Med- icaid, farm programs and a $245 bil- lion tax cut. The plan would balance the federal budget by 2002. "There are continuing discussions with some Republicans to try to have this as a bipartisan amendment," said Associate Vice President for Gov- ernment Relations Thomas Butts, the University's Washington lobbyist. "Obviously, we would like to see something like this pass." The Senate plan would cap the fed- eral direct loan program at 20 percent of all loans, charge a 0.85-percent fee to universities based on the total loan value and eliminate the six-month interest-free grace period following graduation. The amendment would eliminate these provisions. "Senator Simon differs with Re- See HIGHER ED, Page 7A The budget bill before Congress is the centerpiece of the Republican legis- lative agenda, and it dwarfs any other matter that either the Senate or the House has taken up this year in the wake of the GOP's stunning victories last Novem- ber, in which voters gave them control See VOTE, Page 7A NOPPORN IKICHANANTHA/Oaily Per Anger, a former Swedish diplomat, speaks last night to a crowd of 500 at Rackham Auditorium. In theA sixth annual Wallenberg Lecture, Anger praised Raoul Wallenberg's work saving Jews from Nazi extermination. Engineering Prof. Andrew Nagy (left), who was indirectly saved by Wallenberg, also spoke. "We have witnesses who saw him in prison in the '50s," Anger said. He also cited an account by a Soviet doctor who claimed to have seen Wallenberg in a mental hospital outside Moscow, and dismissed theo- ries of an execution., After perestroika, there was more information avail- able. Anger found a copy of Wallenberg's old pass- port. "I was very anxious myselfto see the passport, he said. " The document was found to be valid while he was kidnapped by the Soviets, so the Soviet claim that Wallenberg was detained because ofpassport verifica- tion problems was proved erroneous. Students in attendance said they found the speech moving and enlightening. "I came because it's an amazing event," said RC first- year student Sara Bursac, "to hear someone who knew Raoul Wallenberg, to hear about somebody who helped so many thousand Jews." "Raoul Wallenberg's story is something my father and I shared ever since I was young," said Jennifer Bradley-Swift, an RC first-year student. "It's been something that's been with me through my life. Hearing Per Anger's speech was very moving." Anger reflected on the fate of the man who changed so many lives. "The whole world has a right to know what happened to a man who has become a symbol of humanitarianism for modern times and has become a symbol in the fight for human rights," he said. After six-month vacancy, council OKs Berlin as city administrator I By Maureen Sirhal Daily Staff Reporter About six months of search and debate ended as the Ann Arbor City Council awarded the position of city administra- His request left several council mem- bers troubled. Councilmember Jane Lumm (R-2nd Ward) said she disagreed with the four- year term provision proposed in an ear- Councilmember Stephen Hartwell (D-4th Ward) began what some citi- zens of Ann Arbor called a lynching of a quality candidate. Hartwell distributed a memo blasting .. _ ,... ,> - _ : ,, , .x