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Contenders square off in race for U.S. Senate BY BRUCE SMITH THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CHARLESTON, S.C. - In a de bate that sounded at times like their dueling television campaign ads, U.S. Senate candidates Lindsey Graham and Alex Sanders argued over Social Security, the death penalty and flag burning. With less than a month before Election Day, the candidates seek ing the Senate seat held by the re tiring Republican U.S. Sen. Strom Thurmond met in a hour-long de bate broadcast Sunday in the Lowcountry on WCSC-TV. Both candidates said the other was trying to frighten voters by saying Social Security might one day run out of benefit money. “I’m not going to get elected trying to scare people on Social Security,” said Graham, Republican congressman from the state’s 3rd Congressional District. He warned that, unless something is done, the system will be bankrupt in 2041. Graham supports an option al lowing younger workers to take part of their Social Security tax es and invest them in personal in come accounts to get a better rate of return. “These ads saying I’m putting your money in Enron stock—Alex is a good guy, but this is a national game being played by Democrats that I resent,” Graham said. “It’s not me that’s scaring Social Security Recipients. It’s Lindsey Graham’s failed scheme to allow a substantial portion of the trust fund to be put into the stock market,” Sanders, the Democrat, countered. To preserve Social Security, "we need to simply stop spending the Social Security trust funds for other things," Sanders said. That would leave the program solvent through 2041, by which time a nonpartisan commission could make the needed adjust ments to the fund, Sanders said. The two also sparred over the death penalty. Graham said that, while he respects Sanders’ oppo sition to capital punishment, he thinks giving the death penalty to terrorists is good public policy. Later, Sanders said a constitu tional amendment outlawing burning the flag is not an issue in the campaign, although it’s been raised in some of Graham’s cam paign ads. “Flag burning nauseates me. I’m not in favor of flag burning. At the same time, I’m not in favor of amending that great charter of freedom to take care of a few mis creants who might reassert their right to burn the flag,” Sanders said. Graham said the American Legion is trying to pass an amend ment allowing states and the fed eral government to make laws protecting the flag. He said all members of South Carolina’s del egation in the Congress support such an amendment. "I think it would be a shame if the next senator from South Carolina cast a vote the other way against the will of the people," Graham said. POLICE REPORT I * i These reports are taken directly from the USC Police Department Compiled by Allyson Bird. Each number on the map stands for a crime corresponding with numbered descriptions in the list below. DAY CRIMES (6a.m.-6 p.m.) □ Violent O Nonviolent NIGHT CRIMES (6 p.m.-6a.m.) ■ Violent • Nonviolent CRIMES AT UNKNOWN HOURS □ Violent © Nonviolent Thursday, Oct. 3 ® LARCENY OF WALLET, 6430 GARNERS FERRY ROAD, BUILDING 2 (OFF MAP) Adrienne Brown said someone took her wallet from her closed book bag in a lab room. Estimated value of contents: $100. Reporting officer: D. Hare. ® COLLISION, BA BUILDING METER LOT Seok Hun Ku hit April Kinloch’s vehicle while Ku was backing out of a parking SDacp Kinlnrh was driving through the garage when Ku backed into her. Estimated damage to each vehicle: $300. Reporting officer: T. Cox. Friday, Oct. 4 O SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY, 816 BULL ST., MCKISSICK MUSEUM Bernard Theodore Wanzer was wanted for a parole violation when he was stopped for questioning. Wanzer ran, and officers were not able to find him. Reporting officer: D. Parriiip C^>Vhctl t\w*4 AN HISTORIC RESIDENCE Efficiency $505 One Bedroom $565 Two Bedroom $600 Rent includes all utilities and cable TV. All rates quoted are month to month. (Leases available, prices subject to change) • Located across from the University Of South Carolina Horseshoe and the State Capital, Cornell Arms offers the premier location for downtown living. (803) 799-1442 1230 PENDLETON STREET COLUMBIA, SC 29201 BRIEFLY The Gamecock wins first for advertising The Gamecock advertising staff attended the 22nd annu al Southern University Newspaper Conference in Atlanta, Ga., Sept. 26 to 28. The Gamecock won first place for best classified page, as well as second-place honors for best rate card and best spe cial publication (Discover Carolina). Nineteen schools from Florida, North Carolina, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina and Virginia participated! Students are invited to Holtz call-in show The Student Gamecock Club is sponsoring a special edition of the Lou Holtz call-in show on Wednesday, Oct. 16, at 6:30 p.m. in the Russell House Ballroom. All students are invited to attend. Contest to offer USC and Clemson tickets TicketAdvantage and Wendy’s restaurants will launch the TicketAdvantage and Wendy’s Ticket-to-Win, a contest that will give college football fans the chance to win Clemson or South Carolina football tickets. The contest began Oct. 4 and will run at participating restaurants in South Carolina through October. The promo tion will be supported with tele vision, radio, in-store, and on line advertising, which appear on such sites as clemson tigers.com and uscsports.com. When Wendy’s customers “Biggie Sizes” their orders, they will be given a game piece with a unique seat num ber. Participants must visit www.TicketAdvantage.com to check their seat number and see whether they have won. Prizes include tickets to Clemson vs. N.C. State, Clemson vs. Maryland, South Carolina vs. Tennessee and South Carolina vs. Arkansas football games, as well as the 100th matchup between Clemson and South Carolina. Other prizes include BellSouth prize packs and TicketAdvantage gift certifi cates. STATE Powerball begins with a successful launch ROCK HILL (AP) - Powerball sales were brisk in the first hour after the multi million-dollar, multistate game began in South Carolina, lot tery officials say. Scientific Games, the lot tery’s primary vendor, report ed Powerball sales of more than $29,000 from 11 p.m. when the tickets first went on sale to midnight, South Carolina Education Lottery spokeswom an Tara Robertson said. At one point, lottery play ers purchased about 1,600 tick ets a minute, Robertson said. Across the state, lines formed at some of the 3,000 lot tery outlets where Powerball tickets are being sold. In Fort Mill, people began waiting in line at 9:30 p.m., Robertson said. The Red Rocket Fireworks store there reported more than $700 in sales in one hour, she said. By comparison, the Smokers" Express store in Columbia had about $300 in sales. Voters have 4 weeks to decide on election SUMTER (AP) - Chatting with mall walkers and shop pers here, it’s clear candidates wanting statewide offices had better get busy in the four weeks leading up to the Nov. 5 election. Voters of different ages, races and genders say they haven’t decided who they will cast their ballots for in the U.S. Senate race where U.S. Rep. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., faces Democrat Alex Sanders. And voters say the governor’s race, which puts Democratic Jim Hodges against GOP Congressman Mark Sanford, is wide open. Karen Geddings, a straight ticket Democratic voter wait ing outside a nearby hardware store said she wouldn’t con sider voting for Sanford. “There’s just something about him I don’t like,” she said. “If I had to pick, I’d take Sanford,” said Tommy Thompson, a 25-year-old state worker. Thompson says state employees have gotten less at tention from Hodges than from Republicans. NATION U.S. arrests 6 more - on terrorist charges WASHINGTON (AP) - Six people, including a former U.S. reservist, were charged with trying to travel to Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 attacks and join forces with al Qaida and the Taliban against the United States. Attorney General John Ashcroft, announcing the ar-' rests of four of of them at a Justice Department news con ference Friday, called it a “defining day« in the fight against terrorism. He noted the sentencing in federal court later Friday of John Walker Lindh and the guilty plea in Boston from accused shoe bomber Richard Reid. Ashcroft said one of the men, Jeffrey Leon Battle, joined the U.S. Army Reserves to obtain training in U.S. tac tics and weapons. Ashcroft said Battle, who obtained an administrative discharge in January 2002 while in Bangladesh, intended to use that experience against American soldiers in Afghanistan. Ashcroft said some of the men began traveling to Afghanistan in October 2001 to fight with Taliban troops against U.S. forces. Resolution allowing war expected to pass WASHINGTON (AP) - Congressional leaders said Sunday a resolution authoriz ing war against Iraq, expected to pass with little dissent, will strengthen the U.S. hand at the United Nations and increase pressure on Saddam Hussein to disarm. President Bush, after a weekend in Maine, returned to the White House and pre pared to address the nation Monday night from Cincinnati. He was making the case against the Iraqi pres ident on the one-year anniver sary of the start of bombing in Afghanistan. Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, who has coun seled caution in unilateral moves against Saddam, said he will vote for the resolution but only after trying to make it more to his liking. WORLD U.S. troops destroy 420 Afghan bombs BAGRAM, AFGHANISTAN (AP) — U.S. troops have de stroyed the largest cache of ex plosives yet found in - Afghanistan — hundreds of 500-pound bombs buried in a dry riverbed near Kandahar, the military said Friday. The cache of 420 air-to ground bombs was found in the Dori River channel last month, but it took munitions experts weeks to examine the explosives and decide how to deal With them, Air Force Maj. Steve Clutter said. After evacuating residents, demolition teams used 30,000 pounds of C-4 explosive to de stroy the bombs in a single blast Thursday. Army photos of the blast showed a huge *' mushroom cloud rising over the site. “It was a big bang. It was probably like the Fourth of July down there,” Clutter said at Bagram Air Base, the U.S. military’s headquarters in Afghanistan. There were enough bombs hidden in the riverbed to fill six B-52 bombers, Clutter said. Oil tanker explodes off coast of Yemen SAN’A, YEMEN (AP)-An ex plosion and fire engulfed a French oil tanker on Sunday off the coast of Yemen, and the tanker owner said a small boat struck the vessel in a “delib erate attack.” Yemeni officials, however, - said there was no indication the tanker was attacked and that the fire was caused by an oil leak. French officials said it was still too early to say if the explosion was an act of ter rorism. “We don’t have enough ele ments to allow us to formulate a ... hypothesis which would point to a terrorist attack,” French Foreign Ministry spokesman Francois Rivasseau said Sunday night in Paris. France will quickly send in vestigators to Yemen, President Jacques Chirac’s office said af ter Chirac spoke by phone with Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh. v t-'-;—:-;---— --