The Des Moines Register from Des Moines, Iowa • Page 11

CHARLES SCMLOSSCRTha RtviHtr ISU professor asks, 'Why not blow up the By VERONICA FOWLER 01 Tht Resisttr's Aims Bureau AMES, IA. While others might ask, "Why blow up the moon?" Alexander Abian asks, "Why not?" Abian, an Iowa State University mathematics professor, advocates blowing up the moon and changing the tilt of Earth to get rid of such pesky problems as tides, deserts and chilly winters. Abian even said he would be relieved to not have to look at the moon he finds it rather ugly. "If I were the creator of the whole universe, I would have probably built the universe in a much more pleasant way," Abian said. In fact, he said, perhaps changing the entire solar system would be an even better way to improve the environ would have a bulge there, but who cares about a bulge?" Abian says his plan has the beauty of flexibility as well.

People could totally destroy the moon, or create two moons or three, or four. "Why should we take it for granted that the existing setup is the best possible scenario for our lives?" he asks. "Why should we take for granted that the orbit of our Earth around the sun could not and should not be changed?" We've been stuck with this celestial setup for about 5 billion years, Abian said. It's time for a change. Abian admits that there are those who laugh at his theory.

"Some, of course, grind to powder my debates." Leacock doesn't exactly do any grinding, but does say it's pretty certain the human race isn't going to blow up the moon anytime soon. Even if we had the technology to do so, "it's not clear that we'd want to," said Leacock. way the universe functions. "It could destroy everything, yes, but it could also be a great improvement." While Bob Leacock, an ISU physics professor, thinks Abian is serious about his theory, he prefers "to treat this symbolically" as an intellectual exercise. "I think Abian likes to start people thinking about things," Leacock said.

But Abian points out that he's not proposing that human beings rush into all this. "I'm not saying that we should go out and immediately blow up the moon without preliminary study." People could blow up the moon, take some of the soil and put a big pile of it on part of the southern hemisphere to even out the tilt of Earth, Abian said. Not only would the tilt be solved, but also mankind would have the extra land to live on. While the transplanted moon soil would mean a mammoth bump in the sphere of Earth, Abian doesn't think it would cause any detrimental side effects. "The earth ment.

Changing the orbits of Mercury, Venus and Mars or combining some of these planets into one "could be even safer and easier." Granted, Abian said, destroying the moon could wreak ri iTinritiiM Mumim ii imm jf" iMiiinnniirii incredible havoc on Earth, like starting tidal waves, earthquakes, eternal winters and changing forever the Iowa State mathematics professor Alexander Abian. Iff Sunbatj Kcpistcr RANDY EVANS, Iowa news editor, 515-284-8065 mm mm March 3, 1991 BOB MOOERSOHNTht Rcoitter 1 i Income from bingo leads to new dispute in Mesquakie tribe Tucking away her grief iiThe bingo has been a disappointment to some extent jy -Louis Mitchell Mesquakie tribal chairman -rprt By GENE ERB Raglstar Butiiwu Wrlttr TAMA, IA. When the cavernous "Mesquaki Bingo" hall opened near here in February 1987, many tribal members hoped its revenues would bring better housing, education and direct payments to tribal members. Many also hoped it would provide seed money for more economic development light industry, a convenience store, a Laundromat and other businesses that would provide services, employment and eventual economic independence for the tribe. So far, however, tribal members have seen nothing.

Many wonder what is happening to all of the money. Moreover, they wonder whether tribal leaders can provide the unity and direction needed for long-term prosperity, if and when there is bingo money to spend. The dispute has been marked by allegations of mismanagement of tribal affairs and resulted in petitions calling for removal of some tribe leaders. "The people running things have big heads, but they don't know anything," said Harvey Davenport. "Will the money be used wisely? We don't know.

We can't answer. We're in the dark." The lack of information about a- II bingo operations has spawned a new round of questions in a tribe that has been rocked by scandals, divisions and leadership turmoil. In July 1984, federal auditors said tribal leaders had mismanaged thousands of dollars of federal money. Favoritism had been the primary criterion used in a housing improvement program; new homes were built for members of the tribal administration and their relatives while others in need were denied help, auditors said. In December 1984, tribal members soundly defeated a referendum for high-stakes bingo that leaders said could generate $9 million to $12 million in annual business.

Tribal members finally succumbed to the lure of the potential MESQUAKIE Please turn to Page 6B BILL NEIBERGALLTht Rtgltttr '4- A Abuse victims face serious death threat Women who leave mates are often in worse danger By ANNE CAROTHERS-KAY Rtelstar Staff Wrlttr In their guts, battered women have known what experts have only recently discovered: Living with an abusive man is dangerous but leaving him may get you killed. "Women who leave run a 75 percent greater chance of being killed," said Laurie Schipper, director of an Ames shelter for battered women and their children. "And, instinctively, they know that. We tell them that when they call and they are never surprised." In Iowa, those statistics aren't just empty numbers. Just ask the families of Susan Helm, 26, Thea Duffek, 17, and Melissa Ewart, 19.

During the past six months, Helm, Duffek and Ewart were strangled, bludgeoned and stabbed to death, respectively, after they separated from mates who now are charged with their murders. Seared into Minds Their deaths, say experts, are seared into the minds of hundreds of Iowa women who are trying to get away from abusive men or to survive in a violent relationship because they fear they will be killed if they leave. The fates of Helm and Duffek of Des Moines and Ewart of Keokuk reinforce these women's greatest fear that the system will not protect them if they leave the men who are beating them. "It's a terrible, terrible Catch-22," said Schipper. "We tell them that if they stay, they're in danger, that the violence will become more frequent and more serious.

But if they leave, they may be in even greater danger. "A woman leaving is the biggest threat to his power and control," said Schipper, prompting men to resort to more violent means to control the women, even if it means killing them. And the real tragedy, said Schipper and others, is that the very people who can help keep battered women safe police, prosecutors and judges seldom realize how dangerous and difficult it is for them to leave. Deadly Misunderstanding At the heart of society's inability to deal with domestic violence is a deadly misunderstanding about its psychology, said Dianne Fagner, executive director of the Iowa Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Jim Cory, who recently testified before the Iowa Legislature in support of more money and programs to help victims and mates, said, "For 20 seconds of my life I lost control, and I hit my wife with my hands." His testimony was in support of solutions to domestic violence, but his words were like a red flag to people like Fagner.

"It's not that at all," she said. "It is not a loss of temper or a loss of control. That's a good excuse. What we tell men is that you absolutely intended to do that to scare her, to control her. You didn't lose control you forcefully gained it." Schipper agreed.

"We no longer ABUSE Please turn to Page 5B A 3 Joyce Cutshall, the mother of Jill Cutshall, who has been missing for 3Vi years, recalls the pain and suffering she has gone through since her daughter's disappearance. Below, Omaha Investigator Roy Stephens holds a photo of Jill. Diligent mother pursues quest for missing child; Iowan charged urn, 9- iT i Ben Bear calls out numbers to players at the "Mesquaki Bingo" hall. By FRANK SANTIAGO Rttftttr staff Wrlttr NORFOLK, NEB. Each night when the air cooled and the neighborhood slipped into silence, Joyce Cutshall sat down to pen thoughts to her missing 9-year-old daughter.

Devastated by sadness, she wrote of the pain of looking for Jill Cutshall, of her ache to comfort her, of her unbending will to get to the bottom of what happened to ber. Then when the poignant letters were done, often with tears, Joyce Cutshall, 36, put them away, hoping for a day when Jill might be found and she could share them with her. That day has never come. Three-and-a-half years after Jill Cutshall was taken from the steps of her baby sitter's home, she is still gone. Her mother's letters "therapy," Cutshall says are untouched.

Monday, in a small courtroom at the Madison County Courthouse here, the mystery of what happened to the girl who wrote poetry and dreamed of winning a Nobel Peace Prize, may be resolved. If it is, much of the credit will go to Cut-shall, a mother who refused to back away from the search for her daughter. David Phelps, a boyish-looking 27-year-old from Perry, will be tried on a first-degree kidnapping charge. Phelps, who insists he is innocent, formerly lived in a Norfolk apartment house where Jill was staying with her father. Prosecutors and defense lawyers are expected Please turn to Page SB Pulitzer-winner Clark Mollenhoff dies By GENE RAFFENSPERGER and DANNY KATAYAMA about pursuing stories.

"We used to say he invented investigative reporting," said Frank Eyer-ly, retired managing editor at The Register. "He was aggressive, honest and fair. I don't think he ever let his enthusiasm for an issue warp his writing." Mollenhoff unearthed and wrote stories about corruption and misdeeds by public officials ranging from the Polk County Courthouse to Rtdfttr Staff Wrlttrt Clark Mollenhoff, whose aggressive style of investigative reporting for The Des Moines Register won him many national honors and awards, including the prestigious Pulitzer Prize, died of liver cancer Saturday at Lexington, Va. He was 69. Mollenhoff was a nationally recognized Washington, D.C., reporter for more than 25 years, starting in 1950.

He concentrated on issues such as secrecy in government, labor racketeering and instances in which employees were fired or threatened with firing because they called attention to shortcomings in federal projects. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for national reporting in 1958 for a series of stories that exposed racketeering among some union leaders. Mollenhoff's take-charge style of reporting perfectly fit his physical presence. A football lineman at Drake University, where he was named captain of the team one year, Mollenhoff was 6-feet 4-inches tall and weighed 250 pounds. He had a booming voice that became familiar at televised presidential news conferences and a bulldog-like tenacity MOLLENHnFir Please turn to Page 4B.