Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • Page 17

3 1 S3 Year No. 6 Chicago Tribune 6 Section' NW S. Carolina's local issue' gets spotlight TODAY'S TRIBUNE SPORTS By Bob Kemper Tribune Staff Writer GREENWOOD, S.C. The hundreds of people crowded into the American Legion hall for the John McCain rally Monday started hollering even before David Cook could get the words out of his mouth. All he had to say was that his question was about a "local issue." "Don't!" the crowd yelled in unison.

"Don't ask it!" "It's not about the flag!" Cook, 43, shouted back. But, of course, it was about the flag the Confederate flag flying over the state Capitol in Columbia. That flag has been a source of intense embarrassment for South Carolina. The GOP primary here Saturday has only directed more light on the topic. That the flag still provokes intense debate 135 years after the end of the Civil War has revealed something of the divided psyche of this Many consider the Confederate flag an embarrassing symbol of a divisive past and want the issue to go away.

A majority of South Carolinians, black and white, have told pollsters the flag should come down. But some, particularly in the Republican Party, argue that flying the Confederate flag is a symbol of respect for their heritage. In 1994, Republican primary voters voted 3-1 to keep the flag flying. Efforts to put the flag question on the ballot for the broader voting population have failed. Some Republicans claim the state's black leadership has refused to yield on the issue.

The controversy, some say, obscures the new reality of South Carolina: It is an international hub for business and industry. Over the past decade, the state has added 400,000 new residents, many of them from other states or countries that not only harbor no affections for the flag, but also often reject it as a racist symboL Since 1990, South Carolina has seen about 200,000 new jobs many of them courtesy of foreign corporationsthat are helping to change the See Flag, Page 6 'When the flag makes headlines we lock so bad. We're thouglit of asa pretty redseck Charleston native Catherine Holland Fatal twisters lit Familiar face returns Coming out on the United Center floor for the first time as a visiting coach won't be easy, Phil Jackson concedes. Skip Bayless on the legacy of the Cowboys' Tom Landry "TI 'Landry effectively 1 died as a coach soon 3vTf- after tnat last Super Bradshaw's Steelers. IX.

1 With him went an era A i 8 f.l I'llf- mink 'Freak storm' slams southwest Georgia, killing at least 20 and injuring scores By Dahleen Glanton Tribune Staff Writer CAMILLA, Ga. A series of preseason tornadoes left a 10-mile path of destruction in rural southern Georgia early Monday, killing at least 20 people and flattening a trailer park so badly the governor said it looked like "a bomb dropped on it" After an evening of heavy thunderstorms throughout the Southeast, from Arkansas to North Carolina, the tornadoes touched down just after midnight in this town 200 miles south of Atlanta as many of the 10,000 residents slept. More than 100 people were injured in a four-county area, but most of the devastation occurred in a community of about 125 trailer homes just south of downtown Camilla. At least four tornadoes cut a deadly path southward in Southwest Georgia, packing winds up to 210 miles an hour. More than 250 homes were damaged or destroyed and more than 2,000 homes remained without power Monday night Emergency crews continued searching through the night for more injured or dead.

Though the area had been under a tornado watch most of the evening, the lateness of hour, heavy rains and the fact that tornado season generally does not begin until March caught many off-guard. When the sirens went off, most people didn't hear them. "This was just a freak storm Li sv' in which crewcut players were mostly seen and not heard. As long as Landry's players lived in fear of their father figure's silent glare and unselfishly accepted their role as unpaid cogs, Landry reigned. BUSINESS Radio Flyer on a roll Amid high-tech fare at New York's Toy Fair, an American icon aims to capitalize on nostalgia for red wagons.

Poor find banks perplexing Lack of skills to navigate personal financial services hinders gains for this segment during economic boom times. TEMPO Face value Whether a bead of sweat (Richard Nixon) or a smirk (George W. Bush), candidates' quirks can haunt them. WEATHER Tuesday: Cloudy; high 40 to 55. Tuesday night: Low 30 to 37.

Wednesday: Windy; 32 to 40. Complete report, Sec. 2, Back Page DETAILED INDEX, PAGE 4 U.S. plays down fear of rogue nations Iran, Iraq, N.Korea could be building arsenals for leverage By John Diamond Washington Bureau intelligence now views Iran, Iraq and North Korea as striving to build long-range missiles and nuclear weapons for bluff and leverage rather than for an actual nuclear strike on the United States. New intelligence assessments circulating in classified and unclassified form add political nuance to a view of so-called rogue states that has, for years, focused on technical capability.

The intelligence community now downplays the possibility of an irrational, unprovoked attack. Instead, intelligence analysts increasingly argue that these smaller adversaries pursue weapons of mass destruction for political power and prestige not for acts tantamount to national suicide. This newly emerging view challenges assumptions advanced by Republicans and Democrats that have driven the move to build a $13 billion national missile-defense system. Those assumptions hold that such a defense is required to protect U.S. citizens from erratic and provocative leaders who are not swayed by the certainty of a massive U.S.

military response to aggression. According to the intelligence community, Iran, Iraq and North Korea want to prevent larger, more powerful enemies, including the United States, from being tempted to intervene in their own regional disputes. In short, they want weapons of mass destruction for the same reasons that Russia and the United States built up their arms during the Cold War. North Korea, viewed by the CIA as the greatest near-term threat to develop long-range missiles, already has used its increasing capability as leverage to negotiate with Washington for trade concessions. The CIA has no doubt that North Korea is well aware of the consequences following an actual attack on the United States.

"If North Korea launched, they'd probably view it as one of their last acts," said Robert Wal-pole, the CIA's top strategic weapons specialist "In many ways, such weapons See Missiles, Page 11 AP photo by Ric Feld Sheila (foreground) and Toni Anglin of Camilla, salvage belongings from their home, See Storms, Back Page which was destroyed by Monday's tornado. Camilla was the state's hardest-hit town. Tornadoes in Georgia By month, 1950-1995 Storms across Southeast As a line of thunderstorms descended on the Southeast late Sunday night and early Monday morning, high winds and tornadoes damaged property from Arkansas to North Carolina. WORTH COUNTY Severe weather Tornado and high wind reports for 24 hours ending 8 a.m. EST Monday Whistle-blower's mom tried twice to notify Ryan 12:09 a.m.

EST CamilU Damage: 2 subdivisions and 4 mobile home parks along a 5-mile path LI 1:15 a.m, KEY: Wind reports Tornado reports 1 y-H a.m. 1 LhD ISO I- I 100 J-l' I .11. Jill JCrosland ky. 1 BM jr MITCHELL hp iv rr ll.W. If 1 pn NTV im 1 ll-HH (111) COLQUITT ,1 ARK.

COUNTY cun 1 MISS. C- Zwi COUNTY I JFMAMMASOND 1:10 a.m. Cairo Damage: Extensive damage along a 15-mile path Sources: Storm Prediction Center, The Tornado Project i LJ 1 Chicago Tribune Dolphin calf's death is latest in a sad trend By Gary Marx and Laurie Cohen Tribune Staff Writers The mother of a key whistle-blower in the Illinois licenses-for-bribes scandal provided new details Monday about her attempts several years ago to alert then-Secretary of State George Ryan to corruption in his office. Dorothy Allen told the Tribune that she and her daughter, Tammy Sue Raynor, an employee at the McCook licensing facility, spent more than a year helping Ryan's internal investigators gather evidence of bribery and other alleged wrongdoing. After investigators did not act and her daughter lost her job at McCook, Allen tried twice to tell Ryan personally about the abuses, she said Monday.

Allen said her first attempt was in Dficember 1997, when she tried to contact Ryan, now Illinois governor, by telephone and spoke to his personal secretary in Chicago. Initially, she said, the secretary seemed sympathetic, but in a follow-up conversation later the same day, the secretary was hostile and rebuffed Allen's allegations. "My daughter is being transferred because she is trying to expose corruption at the McCook facility," Allen recalled telling the secretary, noting that she, like Ryan, is a Republican. "I've been a supporter of George Ryan's for a long time. I think his constituents would like to know what's going on." The secretary, who now works in the governor's office, declined to comment.

Dennis Culloton, a Ryan spokesman, also See Ryan, Back Page rt to the age of independence in the wild and how their moms are affected by that loss. For now, Tapeko appears healthy, said zoo officials, who hope to re-open the dolphin exhibit Tuesday. In the meantime, they are investigating the baby dolphin's See Dolphin, Back Page By Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah Tribune Staff Writer Like any desperate mom, Tapeko made every attempt to save her child. In a tank that Brookfield Zoo officials had isolated for the mother and baby, the 17-year-old Atlantic boftlenose dolphin patiently stayed with her calf late Saturday, following it up to the surface when it needed to breathe more frequently and slowing down when the newborn fell out of her "slipstream," a formation in which the calf is kept at its mother's side by a current It was a death that caught officials by surprise.

They had been exultant over the calf "textbook" birth and its quick ability to bond with its mother and to begin nursing within 10 hours. And Tapeko, they said, had been a great mother, showing all the expected nurturing instincts. On Monday, trainers struggled with their own disappointment -at this latest death, which follows several others in the area's captive marine mammal populatioa But they also tried to use the experience to help them learn what causes so many dolphin calves to die only half survive 7 of water. After 45 minutes, the calf sank to the bottom of the tank and rolled onto its side. Tapeko swam after it lifting the baby with her snout and bringing it to the surface, where she handed it over to trainers.

She then watched at the deck as they tried to revive the 12-day-old dolphin by breathing into the blowhole atop its head, in a technique similar to mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, and performing chest compressions. But the mom's and zookeepers' best efforts failed: Brookfield Zoo's newest baby dolphin died at 12:15 a.m. Sunday. I lil III Tribune photo by Mario Petitti Tapeko swims with her calf days after its birth. 11.