Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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Bush wins in Delaware primary McCain takes 2nd; Forbes might quit by Ron Fournier Associated Press Wilmington, Del—Republican George W. Bush won Delaware’s presidential primary. Tuesday and earned a badly needed boost into a Southern show down, even as antagonist John McCain burnished his insurgent candidacy by finishing second in a state where he did not campaign. A weak third-place finish by Sftve Foibes doomed his candidacy. A senior adviser, speaking on condi tion of anonymity, said aides were recommending that the candidate depart the race—and he was like ly to do so. “I think this is a piece of good news that will buoy our supporters,” Bush, the Texas governor, told The Associated Press after securing the state’s 12 delegates. Sen. McCain, who skipped Delaware to focus on the critical Feb. 19 primary in South Carolina, attributed his showing to the momentum generated by his shellacking of Bush in New Hampshire’s lead off primary last week. “It’s bound to give us a boost,” the Arizona sen ator told The AP. “I think there are some good signs for us, but I think we still have a long, long way to go. I’m still the underdog.” Forbes finished a disappointing third after spend ing $60 million on two successive presidential bids, and was taking stock of his campaign. “Clearly, we would have liked to have done better. We will go on to Michigan and South Carolina and assess the situation as things move forward,” campaign man ager Bill Dal Col told The AP. With all 28 precincts reporting, the Texas gov ernor had 51 percent of the vote and McCain 25 percent, a solid victory for the national front-run ner. Though far behind Bush, the Arizonan did sur prisingly well for a candidate who didn’t visit or spend money in the state. By contrast, Forbes had 20 percent after win ning the state’s primary in 1996 and campaigning heavily in the state this year. Former ambassador Alan Keyes had just 4 per cent of the vote. Democrats voted Saturday in Delaware, giving Vice President A1 Gore an easy victory over Bill Bradley. Exit polls in Delaware suggested McCain ben efited from a wave of post-New Hampshire public ity: Almost half of his supporters decided to vote for him in the week since that primary. And a quarter of his backers were new voters who didn’t vote in the 1996 primary. The surveys showed Bush did best among vot ers who are middle class, elderly, conservative and believe he is likely to win the presidency. McCain voters tended to be affluent, well-educated and self identified independents and moderates who said they were looking for a candidate who stands up for what he believes. Forbes, who has pushed for a flat tax since his failed 1996 run, did well among voters who listed taxes as their top concern. McCain’s victory in New Hampshire erased Bush’s lead in South Carolina and dramatically shrunk his advantage in California, Michigan, New York and national polls, as he sought to draw new and in dependent voters into the GOP fold. Looking ahead to South Carolina, where Forbes isn’t a factor, Bush and McCain intensified their rivalry with an exchange of bitterly personal ads. The Texas governor’s spot accuses McCain of hypocrisy over his signature issue of campaign fi nance reform. McCain says in his new ad that Bush “twists the truth like Clinton.” The overheated rhetoric underscored what is at stake in upcoming contests. Despite his financial and organizational advantages, Bush faces a serious threat from the Arizona senator. And McCain, with just one victory under his belt, can’t afford losses to his party’s front-runner. South Carolina will test whether McCain is a one-state wonder or a contender who can foil Bush and his backers in the GOP establishment. Forbes, campaigning to the last at a nursing home, pledged to end inheritance taxes as part of his flat tax plan. “You should be allowed to leave this world unmolested by the IRS,” he told about 60 senior cit izens in a reception room down the hall from a polling place. With little hope in South Carolina, he was fly ing to Michigan, which has its Republican primary on Feb. 22. Arizona also holds its primary on Feb. 22, and Bush has campaigned hard in McCain’s home state and is supported by Gov. Jane Hull. McCain hasn’t ceded any ground in Michigan, where Bush is backed by Gov. John Engler. Virginia conducts its primary Feb. 29, and Bush is backed there by Gov. James Gilmore. More than a dozen states hold primaries or caucuses on March 7, when the nominee could be determined. Despite magazine ties, McCain's South Carolina adviser says he's not racist r\ SOUWiA * CL/ r R DO J Charleston — A South Carolina po litical consultant and adviser to Repub lican presidential hopeful John McCain denies any suggestions he is racist be cause of the magazine he edits. Richard Quinn edits Southern Par tisan, a conservative quarterly about the South. It recently interviewed author Clyde Wilson, who said the “only hope” for the United States is “devolution of pow er so that the healthier parts of Ameri can society can defend and preserve themselves. Defend themselves from the federal government.” yuinn saia ne wasn t involved mine magazine’s daily operations, didn’t read the articles before they were printed and disagreed with “many of the opin ions expressed by others on the pages of the magazine.” The New Republic, however, called Quinn a “neo-Confederate” and said Southern Partisan prints the work of “race-baiters.” McCain was questioned about Quinn on Sunday by ABC’s Sam Donaldson during “This Week.” The Arizona senator said he didn ’t consider Quinn a racist or he wouldn’t have hired Quinn to run the South Carolina cam paign. “ The New Republic and Sam Don atoson naa never neara or me. uovi ously, they were given this by the Bush campaign,” said Quinn, who is the fa ther of state House Minority Leader Rick Quinn Jr. Tucker Mew, the Bush campaign’s South Carolina spokesman, denied that staffers pointed Donaldson to The New Republic article. “ Wfe refuse to drag this race into a discussion about campaign staffs,” Eskew said. Quinn has also worked for former President Ronald Reagan and in. South Carolina for US. Sen. Strom Thurmond, Rep. Floyd Spence and former Gov. Car roll Campbell, Diallo shot several times while lying on the ground, medical examiner testifies m tt . .... ft i i r r- t r. 11_i t... . by i u m riAia Associated Press Albany, N.Y. — Wfest African immi grant Amadou Diallo, killed in a hail of police bullets, was shot several times while falling down and after he was ly ing on the ground, a medical examiner testified today. Dr. Joseph Cohen testified that one bullet went through the bottom of Di allo’s right shoe and came out of his toe. “The entrance is on the undersur face of his shoe and it passes upward through his toe,” he said at the trial of four New York City police officers charged with murder. The officers are accused of killing Diallo by firing 41 bullets into the vestibule of his Bronx apartment build ing Feb. 4,1999. The unarmed black man was struck by 19 bullets. Kenneth Boss, 28, Sean Carroll, 36, Edward McMellon, 27, and Richard Mur phy, 27, pleaded innocent to second-de gree murder. If convicted, each can be sentenced to 25 years to life in prison. The slaying by the four white offi cers produced a wave of pretrial public ity and protests alleging widespread abuse of minorities by police officers. In re sponse, an appeals court moved the case to Albany. Prosecutors allege the plainclothes officers made a “conscious decision” to shoot Diallo without warning. Defense attorneys argue that the shooting was a tragic mistake made af ter the victim ignored orders to stop and pulled out a black wallet that appeared to be a gun. Cohen, who performed the autopsy, described one wound to Diallo’s left leg and noted the “strikingly upward tra jectory of the bullet,” suggesting that Di allo was lying down or filling backward wnen me Duiiei waj> iueu. Cohen also described a wound that hit Diallo’s aorta, the main blood ves sel to the heart, and a shot that paralyzed Diallo by going through his spine and caused him to fall. “There are any number of wounds that could have been inflicted while he was going down,” Cohen said. The pathologist also said tests found no traces of drugs or alcohol in Diallo’s body. Cohen testified a day after a police recruit who lived down the block from Diallo described the volley of gunfire as being broken by a pause that lasted up to five seconds. The recruit, Thomas Bell, was the third former neighbor to describe hear ing a brief interruption in the shooting. The pause is significant because pros ecutors could use it to aigue that the of ficers had a chance to realize that Dial lo was unarmed and stop firing. Bell, 28, testified he was on the tele phone when gunfire erupted. He said he LIFETIME MEMBER MILLION DOLLAR CLUB 24 Hr office # (803)748-9171 Twenty Five Years of trusted service to the university community. ‘‘Her name is her deputation.” j utkuu iuui iu uvc uiuu, iuuuwcu ujr a three- to five-second pause, then a longer, final volley from several guns - a se quence he tapped out on the witness stand. Defense attorneys attacked Bell’s credibility, suggesting that he lived too far from the scene. But the witness stuck to his story. “A pause is a pause, sir,” he told an attorney. _Encounter_ “Where’s The Excitement in your Faith?” Special Guests: Pastor Shives and the Gateway Praise Team Thursday, Feb. 10 @7:00 PM 700 Pickens St. ♦Sponsored by the Baptist Student Union 700 Pickens St. 799-3854 e-mail: BSUUSC@Compuserve.com Find the Best Price on New and Pre-Owned Hondas www.rickhendrickhonda.com HONDA 791-5660 1650 Airport Boulevard • West Columbia, SC 29171 115% Discount W/ Ad & Student ID m Fast Photo EXPRESS 4711-16 Forest Dr. Columbia, SC 29206 (803) 790-1484 Fax (803) 782-329" Flag talk erupts in state Senate by Leigh Strope Associated Press One senator warned of death threats to lawmakers over the Confederate flag while another waved a copy of a plan that could bring it down this year. Senators on all sides of the flag de bate made impassioned speeches Tues day from the floor as behind-the-scenes talks began spilling out in the open. The flag eruption appeared to be a prelude to plans in the governor’s office to produce a grand compromise plan, possibly on Thursday, to bring down the banner from the Statehouse dome. Key senators involved in the private negotiations with Democratic Gov. Jim Hodges met with the governor again Tuesday before the Senate opened to try to get everyone on board with a plan that calls for a row of flags that have flown over South Carolina in its history to line the walkway in front of the Statehouse. The flags would include the Spanish imperial flag, the French imperial flag, the British Union Jack and flags of the Confederacy - but not the one now on the Statehouse dome. One development to watch is today’s election of a Supreme Court justice by lawmakers. Associate Justice Jean Toal is replacing retiring Ernest Frnney Jr., the court’s first black justice since Re construction and the state’s first black chief justice. There are no other blacks on the court. One of the three candidates is black. Earlier Tuesday, more politics got wrapped in the flag when Democrat Bill Bradley, at a black college in Columbia, accused Republican rivals George W. Bush and John McCain of “bottom-fish ing” for support by saying it’s up to South Carolina’s citizens whether to keep the Confederate flag flying over the State house. Republicans vying to win South Car olina’s Feb. 19 GOP primary have avoid ed taking a stand on the flag. “That flag will come down,” Bradley said at Benedict College. But the lawmakers who have sole authority to remove the flag weren’t go ing along. “I don’t know of any further nego tiations that can be done at this hour,” said Sen. Glenn McConnell, R Charleston, a key flag supporter. McConnell said he met with Hodges on Tuesday and isn’t on board with the governor and Senate Majority Leader John Land to bring down the banner with an “avenue of flags” idea or any plan that wouldn’t place the banner at an existing monument in front of the Statehouse honoring Confederate soldiers. Hodges, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and flag opponents say that’s too visible. Sen. Wes Hayes, R-Rock Hill, said he can’t support Land’s bill and won’t be at a Thursday news conference unless the flag on the dome is placed somewhere on Statehouse grounds. The bill didn’t do that Tuesday, he said. Hayes said he’s open to other loca tions than the Confederate soldier’s mon ument. But most Republicans want it there. “A few are willing to consider some where else on Statehouse grounds,” he said. “But I haven’t found any that will support the bill or be present at a press conference if it doesn ’t have a provision in there where the flag is flying on State Flag see page a6 ATTENTION UNDERGRADUATE AND GRADUATE STUDENTS WORLDWIDE ■ ENTER.COM PURSUE JOB AND INTERNSHIP OPPORTUNITIES THAT SPAN THE GLOBE CampusCahfc Center.com The world's largest campus job fair News Briefs ■ Planes collide in midair; three killed Zion, III. (AP) — Two small planes collided over a hospital parking lot Tues day, killing three people aboard one plane and sending the other craft into the roof of the hospital. Windows blew out of the top floor of Midwestern Regional Medical Center as the one-seat Zlin crashed and crum pled. There was no word on the pilot. Two hospital workers were slightly burned and the hospital was evacuated, hospital president Roger Cary said. The other plane, a four-seat Cessna 172, crashed into a nearby street. The three people aboard were killed, said Zion Fire Chief David LaBelle said. The Zlin was registered to Daniel Bit ton, 47, of Waukegan, according to Fed eral Aviation Administration records. Calls to Bitton’s home weren’t answered. WGN radio in Chicago said the plane was co-owned by Bob Collins, a popular morning radio personality for the station. No one could confirm whether Collins was on the plane. The Cessna was registered to ATE of New York, a flying school. A message to the company’s office in Chicago was not returned Tuesday. Les Mussared said he was standing in a parking lot near the hospital when the planes crashed. “I looked up because I heard a gur gling noise. I saw two small planes col lide in the air — they pulled away from each other,” Mussared said. ■ Productivity rises, Wall Street rallies Washington (AP) — A key to eco nomic vitality that also bodes well for continuing low inflation posted the best performance since 1992, a 2.9 percent rise in American workers’ productivity for 1999. Whll Street rallied. A burst in fourth-quarter productiv ity — defined as the amount of output for each hour of work — contributed to the strong performance. Productivity rose by a laiger-than-ex pected 5 percent annual rate in the final three months of last year, the biggest growth spurt since the fourth quarter of 1992, the Labor Department said Tues A~.. Will Street was buoyed by the report, which suggested the economy can con tinue to grow briskly without triggering inflation as long as healthy productivity gains are recorded. ■ Communist Party leader first to file for presidential election Moscow (AP) — Communist Party chief Gennady Zyuganov on Tuesday be came the first candidate approved for Rus sia’s March 26 presidential election, though polls show him still far behind acting President Vladimir Putin. A poll released Tuesday showed 58 percent of respondents would choose Putin if the vote were held now, to 15 percent for Zyuganov, Putin’s leading op ponent. The nationwide poll conducted Jan. 31 by the All-Russia Opinion Re search Center had a margin of error of 4 percentage points.