Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

Deja vu It is legitimate to question former USC interns travel USC's football team has been ranked in the Top 20 of many prestigious publications that decide who's the best before a single game has been played. But one of them, The Sporting News, didn't put USC in its Top 43. The magazine said there are too many question marks, including the loss of most of the starting wide receivers makes it too much of a "What if. . . ?" team. And they also said no one has any idea what the inevitable pre-season controversy would be. This editorial isn't about sports, but is about controversies. For the past five years at USC, there's been some flap that mars what probably would have been a perfect opening of both school and the football season. This past year, just as students were returning to school, they found out that their head football coach, Joe Morrison, was involved in a paternity suit. The year before that ? this was the doozy ? Jehan Sadat, a distinguished visiting professor, quit working for the university, failing to show up for the first day of class and leaving the next day, because of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by a USC student that eventually revealed USC had paid her more than $300,000 in salaries, gifts and expenses for the three semesters she taught at USC. The year before that, the most minor of the incidents, was a flap about the tickets to the USC-Clemson football game. The tickets said "USC versus Clemson, Academics and Athletics," but the "Academics" was conspicuously close to USC and the it A 1 J> : .?1.r A _ y-M Tl,/, /\inieucs was cunspicuuuMy ciusc iu ^icmsuii. 111c iuiks ai the agricultural school Upstate were upset. In 1984, the Associated Press reported that president Holderman had held a lavish conference for Caribbean government leaders, spending more than $100,000 for a tent and carpeting for the coliseum. The list goes on. Once again USC is being scrutinized. The Charlotte Observer reported Sunday and Monday that Holderman spent more than $100,000 in salaries and expensive trips, money spent on his interns. The Observer reported that intern travel stopped in 1986, so some would say that it's not an issue anymore. But the university has said it raised tuition because of a cumulative shortfall in funding dating back about 10 years. So if a shortage of funding in 1978 is affecting USC now, it is still legitimate to question past lavish spending now. These days tuition is going up and up, and housing costs are going up (foYthe first time in years), and suddenly there is a new bousing activity fee. In short, it's a time when USC has become more and more expensive to attend. This issue needs to be addressed. The university administration sometimes seems totally unaware of the burden higher costs for education are putting on students and their families. A university president spending so much on so few while at the same time making the students pay a larger portion of the bill is inappropriate. Holderman's interns are probably among a small minority of students who make $4,000 a year from a campus job. They can afford to be at Holderman's USC, because he has made a place for them. But the rest of us are finding it a little bit hard to swallow ? and to afford. The Gamecock gap: a;.;::;-;:^v- avf ,,,:.V: I ? Best Non-daily Collegiate Newspaper, Southeastern Region Society of Professional Journalists, 1987-88 Editor in Chief Graphics Editor STEPHEN GUILFOYLE MICHAEL SHARP Managing Editor Comics Editor SON HA TRACY MIXSON Copy Desk Chief Adviser WAYNE YANG BILL ROGERS News Editor Director of Student Media HAL MILLARD ED BONZA Assistant News Editor Advertising Manager STEVE PRADARELLI MARGARET MICHELS MARY PEARSON Production Features Editor LAURA DAY SUSAN NESBITT RAY BURGOS Photography Editors Assistant Advertising Manager BRIAN SAULS BARBARA BROWN TEDDY LEPP Datebook Editor JENNY SHARPE .a i* ilii aijl*til lilt MY INTERNSHIP PROGRAM HAP 9 EVERYONE'. 10OT 10 SVRROONP M Wild BRIGHT YOONG MEN W CATERED TO MY \ ^ EVERY WHIM1. \ f -gsi#te 1 *TRTS ASSOf mS[~ W/&RVE, g WT,^ s How do you j I'm interested in becoming ? and I know I'rr not the only one ? a USC intern. I want to make thousands of bucks each semester and travel the country and globe extensivlely. But I've never known how, strange as that is. 1 always knew the president had interns, but nevei just what it took to become and be a Holderclone Do you meander over to the administratior building and tell the president's secretary, "Hey, 1 want to rap with the prez, doll, about this discount travel program for select students." Or do you have to go to one office, fill out an ap plication in triplicate and return it to another, tak< a blood test (in triplicate), take a urine test (ugh one will do), take a lie detector test. . . . Or do you just kind of think and wish and hop< and pray and meditate that your karma will even tnallv t-oqi-Vi nirvana r?f worlfina for Prpsidpni James Holderman? I don't really want to join the Holder-youth, bu I do want to talk about this situation. Like, just of] the top of my head, for example, let's discuss the former Holder-clone who now has a cushy ad ministration job, Glenn German. He was quoted ir The Charlotte Observer as saying the paper was ou to get Holderman. But even in the interview that The Observer': Columbia bureau chief, John Monk, had with the president, Holderman was quoted as sayinj Capitol head I was sitting around the office yesterday trying t< - come up with a column, and a friend suggested write about moving the U.S. capitol to "South o the Border." I thought about it, and, as words can fool you, figured he meant to Mexico. But he said, "No, mean to the tourist trap 'South of the Border' oi 1-95 near the North-South Carolina border." Well, you can imagine my surprise. "What?" I said cringing. "Yeah, you could move it right next to th fireworks stand. And you could make Pedro th reigning monarch." "Are vou on drues?" I asked verv Dolitelv. "Of course not, you fool. Washington is ver crowded and very noisy. It snows there, and it isn' even in a state. How can you run a country unde those conditions? It's not healthy for the karma Besides, everybody knows where it is. Thos sneaky Soviets can get to it real easy. If you move i to Pedro's 'South of the Border,' it would tak years for them to find it. It would be a new twist ii the cold war." He was so happy with himself for that. "Let me get this straight," I said doing my bes Walter Cronkite impression. "You want to mov all the government offices and officials to a touris trap near Fayettevi!'-. n d you want to r ike a car toon character into the ir- n king?" " V up." Ioecause he is my friend, and he owes me 3>i0. couldn't have him arrested. My only option was t< KSGTOR 'MY INTERNS LEARNEP T ivself high living in me v HOTELS AND f 11 UMIVERSITY COULP URN lw mA THEIR 5016 INTO MEN Of THE WORLp." Theftelief PifcW. join aU the presit t T~~??????????- an Qfnniian th: ; IF^ r j~ ! Guilfoyle ^ ; mi I?????????????I pr legitimate questions were asked. fo ; So if you're going to keep so secretive the fact tei that you were an intern who also met Helen Hayes t in '84, by all means be very quiet, Glenn. But don't th babble about vendettas among the press. After stc t Watergate and Gary Hart-gate, the American f public knows that government officials aren't ; always the innocent victims they protest themselves Ch to be. 1 And one of the president's biggest supporters, Etl t USC Trustee Michael Mungo, didn't respond to ing the issue, but asked why an "out-of-state paper" yei 5 was bothering a USC official. Almost all the Bu ; trustees, a happy, together bunch of folks, are the I backing Holderman, but not expressing much of ing to South of 0 to qu *?????????????? Ca y Just Say No, but that never works. So 1 agreed to t take on his idea as my own and try to sell it. sy r One of the greatest advantages of having the th .. capitol at "South" would be that an enormous all e amount of advertising already exists. All those it billboards that line the interstate for hundreds of W e miles could be used to sell governmental programs, n such as they are. That one billboard with the sheep in, on it could be converted to show either donkeys or an elephants depending on who is in office, it .1 don't think we could get Pedro elected as a dc e king, but we could make him attorney general. He an ;t already knows how to steal money from innocent T1 people. It \nother plus would be easy access. eot a rc ' ?oing right 'l-rough the mid- ^ I ti . jaii.j. int.. .a pieniy Oi swci.npianu a o available for parking. Washington can't compare 9 APPRECIATE ?P'5 fixe r mxmw t ^ INGfOR flT7 3111/ ; " \ * Used with the permission ^ ^ of Kevin Siers, The Charlotte Observer. lent's boys? interest in how this administration spends its 5ney. It's good that The Observer is on this story, ley're interested in USC because it's a big, imrtant university not only in this state, but in the >ion and the country. It's a compliment to USC at an out of state newspaper thinks it's portant. Holderman is a lavish administrator in a poor ite, and somebody should be asking if that is or is t appropriate. And the newspaper that's in the st position to do that, The State, has never been iich interested in asking such questions. But that obably has nothing to do with the editor who is a rmer intern and the editor who has two sons in-ned in Holderman's office. But since The State isn't asking those questions, e Charlotte paper stepped in and got a good >ry. rhere's definitely no malice on the part of The arlotte Observer. I'm sure Managing Editor irk Etheridge III knows that his father, Mark tieridge II, the distinguished Pulitzer Prize winn; journalist, taught here slightly more than four irs ago, for a number of years, before he died, t I'm sure both Etheridges would have said it is ; job of a newspaper to report the news. This is news. the Border? that. And now that I'm thinking about it, why is ashington the capitol anyway? I guess the Founag Fathers or dudes in charge at the time figured ey needed to give the District of Columbia mething to do. It used to be in New York way ck when, but the bar scene was too tempting to e senators so they moved it. No one ever teaches a class in mobile capitols, it I think it'd be something special. "South of the >rder" is a good choice, but it could be only one many cities on tour of the country. It'd be unile. What other country in the world moves it's pitol every year? We ought to try it. American government could be a travelling gypshow touring the country introducing peqple to e way the system works. What the heck, it's ready a three-ring circus. Besides mosi people in me country nevei gci 10 ashington. Instead of bringing the people to the capitol brg the capitol to the people. A lot like Mohammed id the mountain. Moving it wouldn't cost as much as government >es now, because you would force the senators id other legislators to live in temporary housing, tere would be no time for bueaucratic stagnation, would keep them on their toes. Maybe after "South of the Border" we could oV? ;t to pi ^cMindo. Of course I don't know W' :-?'o c'uiiu.flu ill lUi'.. So much for my career in p^-uu.