Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!enterpoop.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Headline Article Date: Wed, 25 Nov 92 16:20:05 EST Message-ID: Lines: 232 \SE A;TOP OF THE NEWS;NATION \BY FROM WIRE DISPATCHES AND STAFF REPORTS S=NEW STORY FDA won't take action against Upjohn KALAMAZOO, Mich. - The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, after reviewing whether Upjohn Co. failed to report adverse reactions in people taking the sleeping pill Halcion, said yesterday it won't take action against the company. "We believe that this exonerates Upjohn and our employees," said Theodore Cooper, chairman and chief executive officer of Upjohn, based in Kalamazoo. The drug has been used by millions worldwide, including President Bush. Halcion has been temporarily banned in Britain and other countries and has been alleged to cause violent behavior in users - charges that Upjohn denies. S=NEW STORY EEOC chairman hits Clinton on civil rights President-elect Bill Clinton will have a tough time reconciling statements he has made about minority rights and then following through with action, an outgoing civil rights official said yesterday. Evan Kemp, chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, told the National Press Club that Mr. Clinton has pledged an administration reflecting "the racial and ethnic diversity of our country" while at the same time opposing racial quotas. "President-elect Clinton's promotion of diversity and opposition to group entitlement must be reconciled," Mr. Kemp said. "And I can tell you from experience that this is nearly an impossible job." During a question-and-answer session after his Press Club speech, Mr. Kemp, a Bush appointee who uses a wheelchair, said, "I think that Democrats - and I suspect that even Clinton might be this way - . . . are too paternalistic. They want to take care of disabled people." S=NEW STORY Democrats warn CFTC about filling top jobs Senate Democrats are warning the departing chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission not to fill key senior staff positions before the Democratic administration of President-elect Bill Clinton takes over. In a letter to CFTC Chairman Wendy Gramm, Sen. Patrick Leahy, Vermont Democrat and head of the Agriculture Committee, which oversees the agency, said filling newly created senior executive positions now "would be a mistake." Mrs. Gramm, a Republican, has announced she will leave the CFTC by Jan. 20, when Mr. Clinton is inaugurated. But the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, questioning the actions by 18 federal agencies - including the CFTC - has called for an investigation of alleged conversion of political appointments to career positions in the waning days of the Bush administration. "It's pretty clear who wants to politicize this and it's not Chairman Gramm," a CFTC spokesman said. S=NEW STORY Michigan House passes assisted-suicide bill LANSING, Mich. - A day after Dr. Jack Kevorkian assisted in a sixth suicide, the Michigan House voted yesterday to make it a felony to help someone kill himself. State Rep. Joseph Palamara said the felony provisions send a clear message to Dr. Kevorkian to "hit the road, Jack, and don't you come back no more." The measure, approved 72-29, would make assisted suicide a felony while a citizens commission studies whether to permit assisted suicide or permanently make it a crime. The Legislature would have until Jan. 1, 1995, to act on the commission's recommendations before the felony provision would expire. The measure would impose a penalty of up to four years in prison and a $2,000 fine for any person who assists a suicide. The measure still needs the approval of the Senate, which twice has passed measures to make assisted suicide a felony. S=NEW STORY Scientists to monitor sunken submarine A Russian-American scientific team is mounting an emergency effort to monitor currents and radiation levels near a corroding Soviet nuclear submarine that threatens to release radioactive plutonium, a team member said yesterday. Scientific instruments will be lowered to the sunken submarine and the surrounding area next summer to determine whether any leaking plutonium could contaminate rich fisheries in the nearby Barents and Norwegian seas, said Charles Hollister of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Woods Hole, Mass. "I think the risk to humans through the food chain is very, very low," Mr. Hollister said. Nevertheless, he added, a study of the problem was important because the submarine sank in a turbulent area "scoured by deep-sea storms." Russian engineers told ABC News in a report broadcast Monday that plutonium could begin bleeding from the submarine as early as 1994. The submarine sank in 1989 about 150 miles north of Norway after catching fire, killing 42. It now lies at a depth of about 6,000 feet. S=NEW STORY Florida firm fined for polluting waterways MIAMI - A company has been fined a record $450,000 for contaminating Florida waterways with a chemical toxic to fish and wildlife, federal prosecutors said yesterday. The largest U.S. criminal fine for pesticide pollution was levied against Environmental Waterway Management Inc. under a plea agreement. The case grew out of reports of fish kills in lakes treated by some of Florida's largest pesticide companies. "This case is particularly egregious because they did it for profit and they did it systematically," Assistant U.S. Attorney Angel Cortinas said. "But the whole industry was basically out of compliance." The Davie-based company illegally treated waterways with an algae-killing herbicide containing diuron, prosecutors said. It also committed mail fraud by falsely informing farmers the treatments were approved by federal regulators, they said. S=NEW STORY AIDS patient to spend Thanksgiving at home ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - Ricky Ray, 15, the oldest of three teen-age hemophiliac brothers with the AIDS virus, will be able to leave the hospital and spend Thanksgiving with his family, his doctor said yesterday. Ricky has been hospitalized since mid-October with pneumonia, a complication of AIDS. At one point he was bleeding internally and was believed close to death. President-elect Bill Clinton telephoned him in the hospital the weekend after the election. The Ray family came to prominence when the boys were barred from attending school in Arcadia, Fla., in 1986 and their house was later firebombed. S=NEW STORY Soldier killed in Fort Knox blast FORT KNOX, Ky. - One soldier was killed and a civilian employee critically injured yesterday in a fuel tank explosion at Fort Knox, the U.S. gold bullion depository. Mark Zweifel, a spokesman for the fort, said the accident occurred as fuel was being transferred out of a storage trailer. The names of the victims were not immediately released and the cause of the accident was still under investigation. The accident happened at Hurley Motor Park on the post, and the gold vaults were not affected, the spokesman said. S=NEW STORY First lady says Bushes 'very happy' Barbara Bush said yesterday that she and George Bush are "very happy" and intend to stay that way. "You wouldn't know it, would you?" she told 100 guests at a White House luncheon marking a new round of awards by her family literacy foundation. There have been reports that the president has been in glum spirits since his election defeat three weeks ago and the death of his 91-year-old mother last Thursday. But Mrs. Bush was upbeat at what she called "a celebration of literacy." She quoted an author who defined happiness as "not a state to arrive at, but a manner of traveling. Well, George Bush and I are very happy. You wouldn't know it, would you? . . ." S=NEW STORY Girl's family sues local Scouts council SAN DIEGO - The family of a 6-year-old girl who is suing the national Girl Scouts filed a lawsuit yesterday against a local Scouts council over the same issue - whether the organization can require her to make a pledge to God. The lawsuit was a legal maneuver by the girl's attorney, motivated in part by anger that the original lawsuit was transferred from state to federal court. It came as a temporary restraining order issued against the Girl Scouts in the first lawsuit expired yesterday. The lawsuits make identical claims, but the second against the Scouts' San Diego-Imperial Valley Council seeks $250,000 in punitive damages. A hearing was set for Dec. 2 before Superior Court Judge Judith Haller. The lawsuits seek a ruling that would allow the girl to continue participating in the organization without reciting the part of the Girl Scout Promise that begins "I will try to serve God..." This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM