WFU Debate Loss in Stride

W'INS'l'ON-SALEM JooRNAL a Personal Finance I 89-811 Obituaries I 84 •The Weather I 812 ON STAGE: City can take 1 WFU debate loss in stride or months now, we've been printing welcome ban• ners, offering cabdrivers etiquette lessons and gener• ally spiffing ourselves up Ffor what was supposed to be the big event of the year, the presidential debate at Wake Forest University. We couldn't help crowing about the fact that we beat out Charlotte, our sister city to the South, that grew up to be more glamorous than we are. Now after months of knock• ing ourselves out to make a good impression, there's a possibility that Al and George W. might stand us up Oct. 11. And though Mary this may be a her• esy on par with Giunca admitting that I don't care who wins the next ACC Tournament, I don't think we've lost a whole lot if the guys don't come. Don't get me wrong. I'm happy that for a week or so, the hotels and restaurants will be filled and Wake Forest and the city will get a lot of free mentions on national TV. But we shouldn't wring our hands and gnash our teeth over the possibili• ty that the candidates won't be grac• ing us with their presence at Wait Chapel. In our enthusiasm over this poten• tial moment in the spotlight, the bene• fits have been a tad exaggerated. Faded expectations The way this debate deal was set up, Winston-Salem was a prop in a Cecil B. DeMille-style extravaganza. Tell me the candidates are going to have a town meeting on Salem Square with an audience made up of people who live here, and I'll get excit• ed. But tell me the candidates are go• ing to debate in a tastefully paneled au• ditorium that could be a tastefully paneled auditorium anywhere in the country, and my enthusiasm fades. If the debate had been on Salem Square, the television cameras couldn't help but pick up some of the sur• rounding mellow brick buildings. As it is, the production crew plans to cover up Wait Chapel's stained-glass windows to block out the light. So the one feature that gives the setting some personality is gone. And about the only way John Q. Public could participate is by acting as unpaid labor, known in the language of debatespeak as a volunteer. A matter of honor Some boosters have made much of the fact that only Winston-Salem, San Diego and St. Louis have twice been the host of debates. That may impress the one or two people who have made debate trivia their field of expertise. But don't bet on seeing this as a question on Who Wants to Be a Mil• lionaire anytime soon. It's hard enough to remember what other cities were chosen to be hosts of the debates this year. For the record, they are St. Louis, Boston and Danville, Ky. Debate glory is fleeting. It's like having a walk-on part in a Broadway play. You may remember it for the rest of your life, but the only way any• one else will remember you is if you do something embarrassing. Getting the debate here is certain- ly a recognition of Wake Forest's state• of-the-art technology. But it's also about our city's abili- ty to jump through the series of hoops determined by the debate commis• sion. A good city can do that, but a great city also has spunk and cre• ativity. We need to show those qualities now. Let's not beg. Let's not whine. If the guests of honor don't show up, I propose we do what any other hostess would do in the same situa• tion: Throw ourselves a No-Debate Par• ty. Let's say on Oct. 11, we block off some downtown streets, get a band and invite people to come down and mingle. And after it's all over, we should send George and Al postcards with that classic message: "Had a great time. WISh you were here." •Have an ideafor a column? Call Mary at 727-4089 or e-mail her at [email protected] - -· {01): \0- 9- I 6 2,IJO"O °1]/' /A . ~r.) I • I Monday Return on Th Hunting I or Help September 4, 2000 .,.. Area retailers try to get jump on Investment hiring workers for holiday season Redskins' pricey additions to roster Benefits of Attention pay off in win .,.. Companies encouraged to take over Panthers Program lets teens be pals, mentors to care of employees' well-being HIGH: 83. TONIGHT'S LOW: 68. lliJ> B8 SPORTS,Cl elementary-school kids •TEEN PAGE, 01 Ii" BUSINESS, Bl_ INSTON-SALEM OURNAL Metro Edition www.journalnow.com 50 Cents Tarheel Views of Presidential Probabilities ENVIRONMENT: Loggers like Bush HEAL TH CARE: Drug costs an issue • With the presidential election little more than By Frank Tursi ues. In the face of residents' opposition, By Phoebe Zerwick Democrat Al Gore and Republican two months away, Gov. JOURNAL REPORTER Mobil eventually withdrew, but the JOURNAL REPORTER George Bush are both promising to reform George W. Bush and Vice The presidential election in November threats didn't disappear, McOwen said. Each day, Carroll P. Edwards the federal Medicare program to give mil• President Al Gore, the conjures up old nightmares for Michael He worries that an oil-friendly president takes a heart pill, a pill to control lions of older Americans a prescription• two candidates, are cam• McOwen of Manteo. The outcome, he such as George W. Bush would encour• diabetes, insulin, two kinds of asth• drug benefit. paigning at a furious worries, could mean a return to the late pace. In the second of two age other companies to try. ma medicine and two aspirins. There are other issues in health care - 1980s when oil companies coveted the parts, the Winston-Sa- "He comes from an oil family and has "I got so many I can't remember patients' rights, uninsured children, insur• /em Journal takes a look at vast field of natural gas that scientists taken a strong stand in Texas in favor of them all," he said last week, stand• ance for nursing-home care. where the candidates think lies 38 miles off the Outer Banks. ing at the CVS pharmacy counter at The positions of each candidate will stand on issues important Back then, McOwen and other coastal See ENVIRONMENT, Page A6 Cloverdale Shopping Center. And most likely receive extra scrutiny in For• to people in Northwest residents worried that a proposal by Mo• even with insurance, which Ed• syth County, where Wake Forest Universi• North Carolina. Today: bil Oil to drill off the North Carolina • The 1988 campaign for the presi• wards gets through a Medicare ty-Baptist Medical Center employs about health care and the en• coast I would lead to deep-water ports, dency between Vice President George HMO, his drug bill is more than 10,000 people and is the largest employer vironment. refining plants and industrial develop• Bush and Gov. Michael Dukakis of $200 a month. in the county. Novant Health Inc., the par- ment that would sully the coastal envi• Massachusetts shares some similar• This year Edwards' drug regimen ronment and drive down property val- ities with this year's campaign. A6. is the stuff of presidential politics. See HEALTH ISSUES, Page A6 The Boys of Summer Debate at • WFU Ill question • Bush offers alternative schedule that would put running mates in city, but Gore rejects it By John Railey bates under Bush's plan, which JOURNAL REPORTER Gore rejected. Gov. George W. Bush of Texas Under Bush's proposal, Sen. Jo• proposed a debate schedule yester• seph Lieberman of Connecticut, day that would kill Wake Forest the Democratic candidate for vice University's plans to be host to an president, and Dick Cheney, the Oct. 11 presidential debate, leaving Republican candidate, would de• the school with a debate between bate here Oct. 11. the candidates for vice president. The Bush proposal calls for de• "It's disappointing, but it would bates between him and Gore Sept. still be a very interesting process," 12 in a special, prime-time edition JOURNAL PHOTOS BY CHRIS ENGLISH said Allan Louden, an associate of NBC's Meet the Press, Oct. 3 in professor of communications at Los Angeles on CNN's Larry King Wake Forest. Live, and Oct. 17 at Washington Bush, the Republican nominee University in St. Louis. A second for president, and Vice President Al vice presidential debate would be at Gore, the Democratic nominee, would hold three prime-time de- See DEBATE, Page A7 WINSTON-SALEM JOURNAL Monday, September 4, 2000 PAGE A7 a scheduled visit here Wednesday. It's unclear now if they will still DEBATE come. Members could not be Continued From Page Al reached for comment. Gore accepted the commission's a location yet to be set. KevinCox, schedule last week, and indicated a spokesman for Wake Forest, said yesterday that he is sticking to that that the university had not heard schedule. from the Bush campaign, or from But Louden said that Bush's the Commission on Presidential schedule may eventually prevail. Debates, a nonpartisan group that "The trick is, who has the power to planned the debate schedule that dictate the terms? And the one who included Wake Forest. "All we've wants the debate more usually got is a news report and what the doesn't." campaign is saying.

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