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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 14, 2004)
Today Friday Saturday High: 78 High: 71 High: 64 Low: 49 Low: 50 Low: 46 Precip: 0% Precip: 0% Precip: 20% IN BRIEF Six GIs die in Iraq; Allawi warns Fallujah BAGHDAD, Iraq — A suicide at tack and roadside bombings killed six American soldiers, and Iraq’s prime minister warned residents of insurgent bastion Fallujah on Wednesday to hand over terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi or face mili tary action. Al-Zarqawi’s Tawhid and Jihad group has claimed respon sibility for beheading several foreign hostages and for car bombings throughout the country, and a video tape posted Wednesday on an Islam ic Web site showed militants linked to al-Zarqawi beheading two Iraqis accused of being intelligence officers. — The Associated Press S 'Ti M. Local: Environment left out of presidential debates Continued from page 1 “Environmental issues haven’t come up at all tonight, and that’s a really big thing,” he said. Freshman Laura Hercher said Ker ry presented more information, while Bush sometimes diverged from the questions. “I thought that both candidates presented their views well,” Hercher said. She added that she disagreed with Bush’s comments about the No Child Left Behind Act, which he said has improved education. “I don’t like the No Child Left Be hind Act and I’ve seen the effect of it on my school district back home,” she said. She added that she wished the candidates had talked more about abortion. parkerhowell@ daily emerald, com 020433 CioJjrfsS' )J'jvl4A' WOMEN’S BOUTIQUE buy-sell-trade-apparel-shoes-accessories new gift items Mon-Sat 10:10 *h-5:10ph and Sun IZ-4m 7Z0 fast 13th Ave, Eugene 54I.U5.5099 mmn m Clothes Horse £ Mother Kali’s Help us move our overstocked inventory at the Clothes Horse. Everything in the store will be 1/2 OFF including jewelry & new apparel. Plus racks stuffed with $2.00 bargains. Join us for the fun: Thur-Sun, Oct. 14, 15, 16 & 17. We will not be buying clothes during the sale, nor will store credit be accepted. m Wap e body N O S Street 365 343-6842 M-Sot Sun 11-6 12-4 Canvassing practices under scrutiny Voter registration groups may have been pushed by Republican affiliates to destroy cards from Democrats BY JULIA SILVERMAN THE ASSOCIATED PRESS PORTLAND — Oregon officials have opened an investigation into al leged improper voter registration practices, Secretary of State Bill Brad bury said Wednesday. The investigation comes one day after the deadline to register to vote, in a year when Oregon voter num bers are expected to be up substan tially from the 2000 presidential election. And it comes on the heels of a tele vision report in which a paid-per-reg istration canvasser said he had been instructed only to accept registra tions from Republicans, and that he “might” destroy those from Democrats. It was not immediately clear which group that canvasser was employed by. Bradbury wouldn’t give details on the other allegations, but said complaints have also come from out side the Portland metro area. In Roseburg, Douglas County Clerk Barbara Nielsen said she had received a complaint from voters who said canvassers working for a Chandler, Ariz.-based consulting firm called Sproul & Associates had tried to push them into registering as Republicans, saying otherwise the canvassers wouldn’t get paid for their efforts. Additionally, Nielsen said she had gotten calls from voters who refused to give their names, but said that canvassers from the same group had implied that their cards wouldn’t be turned in if they registered as Democrats. Sproul & Associates is run by Nathan Sproul, a former head of the Republican Party in Arizona who has subcontracted with the Republican National Committee to do voter outreach efforts. Sproul told an AP reporter in Las Vegas that “we registered anyone who wanted to register.” A spokesman for the Republican National Committee issued a state ment Wednesday that said its party has “a zero-tolerance policy for any thing that smacks of impropriety in registering voters.” It is not yet clear whether any pos sible voter fraud in Oregon might be tied to similar allegations of Sproul & Associates voter fraud in Nevada. In Nevada, also considered a bat tleground state by both Democrats and Republicans, a former employee of a Sproul & Associates group called Voter Outreach of America told re porters on Wednesday that he had seen his boss shred eight to 10 De mocratic registration forms. Sproul denied any shredding occurred. Bradbury said the source of any problems may be linked to groups that pay canvassers per registration. Other stories of unorthodox voter registrations have also surfaced throughout the state. In Eugene, several University of Oregon students were approached by canvassers circulating a petition to crack down on child molesters and told they must register as Republi cans in order for their signatures to “count.” “They told me that by registering as a Republican, 1 would be helping people fight child molesters," said Elizabeth Thygeson, 19, who had al ready registered as a Democrat. “1 didn’t appreciate that. It wasn’t ex actly the truth.” This isn’t the first time that Sproul & Associates have surfaced in Ore gon. Last month in Medford, a librar ian was approached by a group claiming to be affiliated with the pro gressive, nonpartisan America Votes organization, with a request to set up registration booths in the library. When librarian Megan O’Flaherty probed into the group, she found that instead, they were part of Sproul & Associates, and had nothing to do with America Votes. National: Taxes a 'flash point' for candidates Continued from page 1 — the two rivals standing behind identical lecterns set precisely 10 feet apart. Bush was on better behavior, though, and there was no grimacing and scowling this time when it was Kerry’s turn to speak. The encounter was also a policy wonk’s dream — a blizzard of facts and figures, references to “budget caps” and other terms meaningful only to Washington insiders. It also turned into a tug of war of sorts over Sen. John McCain of Ari zona, the Republican maverick who is Kerry’s Senate friend but Bush’s cam paign supporter. Kerry twice invoked his name during the debate, and the second time Bush pounced. “John McCain is for me for presi dent,” he said, because of his position on Iraq. Kerry, he said, offers a policy of “retreat and defeat.” Taxes were a particular flash point between the president and his challenger. Questioned by moderator Bob Schi effer of CBS, Kerry said he would fol low through on his plan to roll back tax cuts for Americans who earn more than $200,000 a year while preserving the reductions that have gone to lower and middle income wage earners. Under Bush, he said, the tax burden of the wealthy has gone down and that of the middle class has gone up. But Bush said Kerry would never stick to his promise and his election would mean higher taxes for all. Bush said that in more than 20 years in the Senate, Kerry had voted 97 times to raise taxes and twice as of ten against cutting them. “Anybody can play with those votes, everybody knows that,” Kerry retorted to Bush. “Senator, no one’s playing with your votes,” the president said. Bush made a similar point when the debate turned to health care. While Kerry said he had a plan to help expand health coverage for those who lack it, Bush said, “plan is not a litany of complaints. And a plan is not to lay out programs you can’t pay for.” The president said Kerry’s proposal would cost the government $7,700 per family. “If every family in America signed up, it would cost the federal government $5 trillion over 10 years,” he said. “It’s an empty promise. It’s called bait-and-switch.” The two men disagreed over abor tion, Kerry saying the choice should be “between a woman, God and her doctor. ” The president said he wants to pro mote a “culture of life,” and said Kerry voted “out of the mainstream” when he opposed legislation to ban so-called partial birth abortions. Asked directly whether he supports overturning the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that gave women the right to abortion, Bush sidestepped. “What you’re asking me is will I have a lit mus test for my judges, and the an swer is no,” the president said. The president dodged a bit, too, when the issue of a minimum wage increase came up. Kerry said emphatically he favors one, and said that Republicans in con trol of Congress had repeatedly blocked Democratic attempts to pass legislation. Bush said he supported Mitch McConnell’s bill to raise the minimum wage, without explanation. Mc Connell is a Republican senator from Kentucky. As a candidate four years ago, Bush said he favored raising a minimum wage so long as individual states were permitted to exclude workers within their borders. Bush and Kerry agreed on one point, stating that marriage should be preserved for heterosexual couples. But they gave different answers when asked about whether homosexuality was a choice. “1 don’t know,” said the president. Kerry referred to Vice President Dick Cheney’s gay daughter, and said it was not a choice. “We’re all God’s children,” he said. Kerry said that the recent expiration of a ban on certain semiautomatic weapons was a “failure of presidential leadership” and that be cause of it, terrorists can purchase weapons at gun shows in the United States. Bush said there weren’t enough votes in Congress to extend the ban. But Kerry said if he were told to by Tom DeLay, he’d insist on a fight to win the necessary support. DeLay, R Texas, is the House majority leader and an opponent of gun control. Asked about the Catholic bishops who have advised parishioners it would be a sin to vote for a candidate who supports abortion rights, Kerry evoked the name of John F. Kennedy, another Massachusetts senator and the first Catholic elected president. He quoted Kennedy’s famous 1960 campaign statement in which he said he wasn’t running to become a Catholic president, but the first presi dent who happens to be a Catholic. 20% OFF OLYMPUS® DIGITAL CAMERAS' 13th & Kincaid ■ 346-4331 ■ UOBookstore.com Limited to stock on hand. 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