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STATE Military out-pays some civilian jobs COLUMBIA (AP) -It pays to join the military, at least in South Carolina. Most South Carolinians called up for active duty make as much or more money in the military as they made in their civilian jobs. It’s no,t that wages are high for those in the military, but that the state’s per capita civilian in come is about 80 percent of the national average, military offi cials said. When Air Force Tech Sgt. Jonathan Henry was asked about his pay, the reservist just smiled. When Air Force Tech Sgt. Jonathan Henry is on active duty, he makes about $3,000 a month, plus $225 for being in a combat zone and $250 for being separated from his family. That puts his active-duty military pay at $3,475 a month. That’s about 50 percent more than he gets for his regular job as a sergeant with the Lee County Sheriffs Department. Bad-check program to begin in counties COLUMBIA (AP) -People who write bad checks may be able to avoid criminal charges under a new program started by South Carolinas prosecutors. The program, which legisla tors have authorized for a one year trial, requires those who write bad checks to make full restitution to avoid charges, said William Bilton, executive director of the state Prosecution Coordination Commission. • Bounced checks cost South Carolina businesses at least $300 million a year, said Jim Hatchell, president of the South Carolina. Merchants Association. Next to shoplifting, bad-check writing is the most common crime faced by businesses, he said. But prosecutors say most peo ple do not intentionally bounce checks. The pilot program initially will run in Lexington, Florence, York and Dorchester counties, Bilton said. Beaufort County prosecutors also want to partic ipate, he said. Solicitors in those counties plan to make presentations to their county councils in the next week or so, he said. NATION Judge allows prison guards’ testimony FAIRFAX, VA. (AP)-The judge in the capital murder trial of Lee Boyd Malvo will allow the testi mony of two prison guards who say the sniper suspect bragged to them about committing sev eral of the shootings. Defense lawyers had sought to suppress the testimony of Maryland prison guards Joseph Stracke and Wayne Davis, con tending that Malvo had already invoked his right to remain silent by the time he had spoken with the guards. But Circuit Judge Jane Marum Roush ruled Tuesday that the testimony can be heard at trial, set to start Nov. 10. “Although Malvo was in cus tody, and the prison guards were law-enforcement officers, Malvo initiated the conversa tions, and the guards did noth ing deliberately to elicit any in criminating statements,” Roush wrote. Malvo, 18, and fellow suspect John Allen Muhammad, 42, have been charged with 13 shootings, including 10 deaths, during the three-week spree that terrorized the Washington area last fall. Cruise ends early after stomach virus NEW YORK (AP) - A cruise across the North Atlantic was cut short Tuesday after more than 300 passengers and crew mem bers became sick with a highly contagious stomach virus that caused vomiting and diarrhea. Only two passengers re mained ill when the Regal Princess docked in New York City one day earlier than sched uled, said Steve Nielsen, vice president of Caribbean and Atlantic operations for Princess Cruises. They were expected to be well enough to leave the ship on Wednesday. It was the latest in a line of cruise ships in the past year to be infected with a norovirus, which are spread through food and water and close contact with infected people. The virus caused some passengers on the Regal Princess to vomit in the dining room and on the deck. Of the 1,528 passengers aboard the Regal Princess, 301 passengers became ill, said Julie Benson, spokeswoman for Princess Cruises. WORLD Astronomers will monitor asteroid LONDON (AP) — An asteroid two-thirds of a mile wide has been spotted in distant space and will be closely studied for its possible future course while visible over the next two months, British astronomers said Tuesday. The astronomers said that there was no cause for alarm be cause there was only about a one in a million chance that the asteroid, known as 2003 QQ47, could ever reach Earth. “There is some uncertainty about where it is going. In all probability, within the next month we will know its future orbit with an accuracy which will mean we will be able to rule out any impact,” said Alan Fitzsimmons of Queen’s University, Belfast, Northern Ireland. The asteroid’s current orbit calculations are based on just 51 observations during a recent seven-day period, and the risk of a collision could decline fur ther as its movements are tracked. Coughing could aid during heart attack VIENNA, AUSTRIA -Coughing vigorously until an ambulance arrives could save the lives of heart patients who are going into cardiac arrest, a doctor said Tuesday. Dr. Tadeusz Petelenz, a re searcher in Poland, said the technique, called cough CPR, forces blood to the brain while the heart is starting to fail and keeps patients conscious long enough to call for help. It may also rectify their heart rhythm, he told a meet ing of the European Society of Cardiology. He recommended Cough CPR be taught to the public, but other experts said while the concept is provocative, it needs more study. Every year about 300,000 peo ple in the United States die from sudden cardiac death. Cardiac arrest can be caused by a sudden problem with the heart’s rhythm — ventricular fibrillation. It can also be caused by a heart attack, which occurs when a blockage cuts off the heart’s blood supply. Arafat could be expelled by year’s end, Israeli official says Defense minister calls Palestinian leader biggest obstacle to peace BY RAMIT PLUSHNICK-MASTI THE ASSOCIATED PRESS JERUSALEM — Israel could seek to expel Yasser Arafat by the end of the year, the defense minister said Tuesday, calling the Polnofinion leader the biggest obstacle to peace. Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, who has long supported expelling Arafat, issued the warning as Arafat and his prime minister, former deputy Mahmoud Abbas, remained locked in a power strug gle. Abbas, backed by the United States and Israel, is increasingly unpopular at home and could be ousted, possibly in a Palestinian parliament vote next week. Arafat and Abbas have clashed on control of security forces and key appointments, threatening a rift that could hinder peace ef forts. Palestinian Cabinet Minister Ghassan Khatib said Mofaz’s threat of expelling Arafat only raised tensions, “but is consistent with the spirit of escalation of the Israeli leadership.” Israeli soldiers, meanwhile, killed an Islamic Jihad militant who drew a pistol on troops at a West Bank roadblock Tuesday, military sources said. They said a second militant riding in the car was arrested and an assault rifle I “Arafat, of course, has become the most significant obstacle both to the leadership of (Abbas) and the peace process.” SHAUL MOFAZ ISRAEL DEFENSE MINISTER seized. An Islamic Jihad leader who spoke on condition of anonymity identified the dead man as Abdel Kader Dali, a wanted militant. The leader called the shooting an “as sassination” and vowed revenge. In an interview with Israel’s Army Radio, meanwhile, Mofaz said Arafat was blocking progress on the U.S.-backed “road map” to peace, which envisions a Palestinian state within three years. “Arafat, of course, has become tho mnct ciffnifi. cant obstacle both to the lead ership of (Abbas) and to the peace pro cess,” Mofaz said. “I think that he has to disappear from the stage of his tory, and not be included in the ranks of the Palestinian leader ship.” The defense minister said Israel made a “historic mistake” when it decided not to exile him two years ago. “With regard to the fu ture, I think we will be compelled to deal with this issue within a rel atively short period of time, very possibly even this year,” he said. Mofaz said if Israel decides to expel Arafat, the timing would have to be chosen carefully so as not to undermine Abbas, who Israel believes is serious about reaching a peace deal. Israel’s Cabinet has repeatedly considered expelling Arafat, but Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has blocked such a move, in part because of opposition by the United States and because his security advisers have cautioned against it. Fearful that the conflict be tween Arafat and Abbas could lead f to more serious internal strife, Palestinian mediators continued to shuttle between the two leaders - who are not on speaking terms — in an attempt to resolve their dis pute over control of security forces. Nearly 200 Palestinian legisla tors, academics and writers ap pealed to both men in newspaper ads Tuesday to resolve their dif ferences, saying the deadlock was hurting Palestinian interests. “We call on you to stop all actions that may open the door to foreign interference,” the ad read. Palestinian security chief Mohammed Dahlan, who is close to Abbas, suggested the tensions defied a permanent solution. He told the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera there might be a temporary compromise “until the next crisis, in a week, a month, Saying the Palestinians haven’t done enough to break up militant groups, Israel has car ried out six helicopter missile at tacks aimed at Hamas members in the past two weeks, part of a tough, new policy adopted after a Hamas suicide bombing in mid August killed 21 people on a Jerusalem bus. Mofaz said there will be no let up in the campaign and that “Hamas is in distress because of our activity.” In the Gaza Strip, a 29-year-old bystander injured in a helicopter missile strike Monday died of his wounds, hospital officials said. That strike also killed one Hamas militant and injured two dozen. Another wounded bystander, an 11-year-old girl, died Tuesday of injuries sustained last week in a missile strike. In all, 16 Palestinians, including 11 Hamas members and five bystanders, have been killed in the missile strikes. i Cancer death rate steadies, treatments lag, report finds BY LAURAN NEERGAARD THE ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON - Cancer deaths may be leveling off after several years of decline, and many states are lagging in proven methods to fight the most common tumors, says the nation’s annual report on cancer. Sixteen states spend less than $1 per person on tobacco control — far less than the $5 to $10 per person recommended — even though smoking is the leading cause of lung cancer, the nation’s top cancer killer. Screening for breast and colorectal cancer varies widely, too. And there’s a widening racial gap as white Americans increas ingly survive certain tumors bet ter than blacks, says the report published Tuesday in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. The report’s overarching find ing is somewhat sobering: Death rates for all cancers had been inching down by about 1.4 per cent a year through the mid 1990s, but by 2000 that decline seems to have leveled off. At least part of that is due to a statistical quirk — a change in how cancer deaths are recorded that mean fewer were being missed in national counts start ing in 1999. Still, “we’re seeing perhaps a slowing of the decline,” said Brenda Edwards of the National Cancer Institute, which co-au thored the report with the cancer society and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “It gives us pause.” An estimated 556,500 Americans will die of cancer this year, and 1.3 million will be di agnosed with it. Death rates for the four most common cancers — lung, breast, prostate and colorectal — still are declining for all but one group, women with lung cancer. Lung cancer deaths are increasing by just under 1 percent a year among both white and black women. Most striking are the racial disparities. By 2000, death rates for whites were substantially lower than those for blacks, par ticularly among breast and col orectal cancer patients, where the gap appeared to have been widening. Although breast cancer inci dence is 16 percent higher in white women, black women are far more likely to die. Indeed, while breast cancer death rates dropped 2.5 percent a year for white women during the 1990s, death rates dropped just 1 percent a year for black women. Similarly, black men and women are more at risk of get ting and dying of colorectal can cer than whites, and white sur vival improved more than that of black patients through the 1990s. These imbalances “would sug gest perhaps the black population I ' • ” ” , ' is not receiving the same benefit from early detection and treat ment as the white population,” said CDC epidemiologist Hannah Weir. While socioeconomic factors play a role, scientists cannot yet fully explain the gap. Then researchers examined states. By 2010, the government wants no more than 12 percent of the population to smoke. Utah is clos est to that goal, with 13.3 percei^| of adults who smoke and with tmB fewest deaths from lung cancer. The worst state for smoking is Kentucky, where 30.9 percent of adults light up, and the lung can cer death rate is the nation's highest. Kentucky spends just 84 cents a person on tobacco-control pro grams. Utah, where the predom inant Mormon church is a strong anti-tobacco influence, spends $2.46 per person on tobacco con trol. Cancer screening varies wide ly, too. Women aged 40 or older are supposed to have mammo grams every year or two. In Indiana, just 30 percent of unin sured women do. Similarly, the governmen^^ wants at least half the over-^B population to be getting regula^^ colorectal cancer screening by 2010. In many states, well below 40 percent do. --:-i-1 SURFYOURSELF State cancer data can be found at: http://www.statecancerproflles.cancer.gov Colleges try to deter student file-swapping _ BY ALEX VEIGA THE ASSOCIATED I’RESS Students arriving for fall class es at colleges across the country are facing new restrictions and stem warnings to discourage the swapping of pirated music and movies over high-speed campus Internet connections. Some schools are even using software to choke the amount of data that can flow in or out of a computer when students use Kazaa and other file-sharing pro grams. And in a new approach dis closed Tuesday, at least a dozen universities are exploring ways to offer students a fee-based mu sic service whose fees could be bundled with room and board costs. “’We’re feeling a great deal of pressure as a result of what the entertainment industry is doing, and we’re stepping up a lot of ac tivities to address it,” said Jim Davis, associate vice chancellor for information technology at the University of California, Los Angeles. Last year, UCLA received dozens of notices every month from record companies and movie studios complaining about copyright violations. The Recording Industry Association of America regards file-sharing as theft. Last spring, the RIAA settled lawsuits against four college students who al legedly offered thousands of songs for download on their campus networks. The group is expected to file several hundred more copyright infringement lawsuits this month. At least 10 universities have been served with subpoenas de manding they help the recording industry identify possible targets of such lawsuits, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an online civil liberties group. Overall, RIAA President Cary Sherman said he is gratified by the attention copyright viola tions are getting on campuses. "There’s a world of difference this year than just a year ago in terms of the seriousness that uni versities are taking this issue,” he said in an interview. In a conference call Tuesday, Sherman said the RIAA has not threatened to sue schools them selves but has instead spent more time persuading them that stop ping file-sharing "is the right thing to do.” Many universities also are ea ger to keep their computer net works unclogged by the transit of huge song and movie files. Sharing of music files is a cru cial issue for the industry, which claims the practice is largely re sponsible for a 31 percent drop in CD sales since mid-2000. The industry has begun to em brace for-pay download services, particularly the successful Apple iTunes for Macintosh users that requires no subscription fee. But a successful Windows-based ser vice for the vast majority of home computer users has not yet emerged. Meanwhile, though, several universities are exploring ways to make music-downloading ser vices available to students at a cost that could be incorporated into room and board bills, much like cable TV and newspaper de livery fees. "If music is that important to our students, some of the things we might do is simply provide the music to them, by contract ing with an online service for ei ther streaming, so students can listen to it whenever they want, or perhaps to download, maybe even to make a copy,” said Graham Spanier, president of Penn State University and co chair of a committee of college and entertainment officials work ing together to stop song-swap ping on campus. The more visible tactic this fall is schools’ increased mention of the issue in student orient^^ tions, e-mails and ads in campu^P newspapers. "When I first got here, there was no real warning given to stu dents,” said Errol Wilson, 20, a junior at the University of Southern California. "Since then, it seems like they’ve definitely beefed up.” Wilson, who has downloaded about 200 songs, said USC warned him about his file-shar ing when he was a freshman. But he hasn’t received any other com plaints since he changed his computer’s settings to block oth ers from uploading music from his hard drive. Even when they block file-shaj^ ing, users of swapping softwa^B can still download from others. Sherman praised technologi cal strategies in place at some schools, like the University of Florida’s filtering program that blocks song-swapping. Ohio State University forbids all server based applications by students living on campus. Water Line CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 will be allowed in the right lane. “The break has been fixed, but now we have to repair the con crete at the main excavation i .: - point,” Dooley said. Dooley hopes to have Huger Street reopened by Thursday morning. Robertson said that business will go on as usual and that he hopes there will be no prolonged damage because of sediment clog ging pipes and filters. “These things happen,” he said. “They did the best they could. It’s just a terrible incon venience.” Asst. News Editor Alexis Stratton contributed to this report. Comments on this story? E-mail gamecockudesk@hotmail.com THE GAMECOCK w Interest meeting tonight, 7 p.m. in the Russell House Ballroom - ui— — — — ■■■»!■•• — -- -I- • - ■' "'Hr