North Carolina Now; North Carolina Now Episode from 02/13/1995

There's a reason really. Have you been to worse. Oh you know. Tonight the story of North Carolina's most famous twin. Good evening I'm Erin Hart. Hope you enjoy your weekend we've got a very special program for you tonight.

We are taking you to the 10th Annual emerging issues form the theme to this year's forum held at NC State University is power politics in a changing world. And later we'll introduce you to ing and Chang the world famous Siamese twins who lived most of their lives here in North Carolina. But first tonight we're dedicating most of our show to the emerging issues forum and to the gala event at the Museum of Art in Raleigh where many of the forum participants are gathering tonight. Here to tell us more about that is Audrey Cates Bailey who is on location at the North Carolina Museum of Art Audrey. Hello there Mary Lou how you doing. Good thank you you look wonderful. Thank you very much. Well this is the 10th anniversary of emerging issue storm and they are celebrating in grand style tonight with a reception and a gala dinner and the dinner speakers this evening will be David Gergen. And we'll be back a little later with a couple of interviews and special interviews for you in the program. Looking forward to that. Thank you so much Audrey will be talking with you a little bit later on. Meanwhile Bob Garner has been covering today's portion of the emerging issues Foreman has this report on the

keynote addresses. On this 10th anniversary edition of the emerging issues forum the discussion is centering around America's role in changing global politics. Keynote speakers for the first of two days of the event included Georgia senator Sam Nunn former chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and United Nations ambassador Madeleine Albright. Nunn who is widely regarded as an expert on defense and foreign policy outlined his views on the obligations of a superpower. He said one of the most vital obligations facing the U.S. in the post-Cold War era is preventing weapons proliferation especially nuclear weapons in the former Soviet Union. It took a long time to build up the kind of weapons that we have today in this country and around the world it's going to take just as long and probably more money to get rid of it's going to take an enormous amount of money to destroy 30000 nuclear weapons in the former Soviet Union. It's going to take an enormous amount of money to destroy 40000 tons of chemical weapons.

At least that are in the former Soviet Union and we don't even know now to this day how much they have in terms of biological weapons. So we have a big job ahead of the United States has a big job here. We don't have as many weapons to destroy but we have a lots and lots of weapons and a lot of chemical weapons. The funny thing about destroying chemical weapons wherever there's a chemical weapon location and here the United States and Russia are about alike people that live in that area really want three things they say they want to be taken out of the area but they don't want to move by transport and they don't want to burn. So you know there's no way you can satisfy all three of those and we've got that in spades both here and in the former Soviet Union so preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction preventing their spread around the globe to me is the number one vital interest the United States has and it's the number one responsibility we have as a superpower in terms of leaving a world for our children

and grandchildren that will be a decent place and a safe place to live. Nunn and Republican Senator Richard Lugar have been heavily involved in the weapons collection and destruction programs as well as in other initiatives to promote stability in the former Soviet Union in a session with reporters none knowledge that the actual destruction of nuclear warheads is going very slowly and is expensive. But he says it's well worth the trouble and cost. If you look at the payoff. We've spent trillions of dollars defending against these weapons. If they sold these weapons to countries in the Middle East or other places rather than dismantling them we would spend probably trillions of dollars in the next 20 30 years defending against them again. So we're much better off helping them with hundreds of millions of dollars now in terms of getting those warheads destroyed. We probably have spent more just trying to locate these warheads over the last 20 years without intelligence resources than the resources will take to dismantle them. None said he hopes thousands of scientists from the former Soviet Union will be recruited to work in the

United States and especially in areas like North Carolina's Research Triangle. Ambassador Madeleine Albright delivered a spirited defense of the United Nations in the face of recent moves in the US House to weaken American participation in the organization. Albright did acknowledge mixed success and failure as she detailed highlights of the UN's past three years. An astonishing transition to democracy in Cambodia. A peace agreement and subsequent demobilization in Mozambique hundreds of thousands of lives saved in Somalia. But our long term outlook remains grim. A heroic humanitarian effort in Bosnia but in circumstances that remain tragic and unsatisfying. The evidence of the past three years is that peacekeepers can accomplish much where the local parties have grown weary of war but they will have great difficulty for one or more of the factions remains more interested in conquest than

coexistence. This limitation which is partly inherent in the US and partly correctable has caused some to want to give up on U.S. peace U.N. peacekeeping altogether. A bill will be voted in the House of Representatives this week that would do just that leaving the US with a poor choice between acting alone or not acting at all. When crises arise. If such a bill were to become law we could expect the sudden withdrawal of peacekeepers from such tinderboxes as Cyprus the India-Pakistan border the Middle East and Bosnia and a greater chance of humanitarian catastrophe in Africa and an end to international monitoring over Russian peacekeepers in the foreign former Soviet Union. Albright said the United Nations provides the U.S. additional muscle in areas like imposing economic sanctions and that it also performs a vital humanitarian relief role

in an impromptu news conference. She liken the organization to a single tool in a carpenter's chest. Don't think of the UN as a world government. Don't think of the UN as an end in itself. Don't think of the UN as the only tool that the United States has. Think of the UN as a good supplement when we want others to help carry the load and share the risk. Father we give a celebration be conference picked up tomorrow morning with speakers including former Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger and trade representative Mickey Kantor. And now we go back to Andrea at the North Carolina Museum of Art where she is standing by with a special guest Audrey Yes Marilou I'm back now and my guest is Eric Block who is the former director of the National Science Foundation and now a fellow with the Council on Competitiveness. Thank you so much for being here with us on all. Now we this the whole focus of this conference is how politics and the changing world. What is the key to maintaining the United

States competitive edge in this changing world. Well it's a number. First of all it's education and training of our workforce. Secondly it's the construction of an infrastructure that is the best in the world. And I I in national information infrastructure is being talked about telecommunication in general. Computers and what have you. And last but not least it's how we cooperate among ourselves between government industry and academia and that is a very important part of our competitiveness. If we do it or we don't do it you say cooperation among ourselves is there any concern now with all the changes that are happening in Washington and on many state levels that that cooperation might erode it anyway. Well I hope not but there is that concern because some people down on the CIA and why that is happening and the reason it's happening is because we are facing a different world. It's it's a competitiveness today and not a military

conflict which is that's a forefront of things and we need to work together because each part of our society industry by itself cannot do it by itself. Government cannot do it by itself. And we shouldn't confuse what we are trying to do with what has been called industrial policy because it is not in the US policy. It's pretty far removed from it. Well tomorrow you make your address to the conference and the focus of your speech was that if you did. And we thank you for giving us a preview. Well good luck tomorrow and we thank you for sharing some time with us this evening and have fun at the sea. Not at all I'm glad to be you. Thank you. All right Mary Lou back to you I will be back later with another guest here we look forward to that. Up next details of the governor's budget released today Michel Louis we'll have that story in the rest of the day's news followed by more from the emerging issues form so don't go away. Good evening I'm Michel Louis with a review

of North Carolina's top news stories. Governor Jim Hunt unveiled its 10 and a half billion dollar 1995 97 budget proposal this morning. The plan calls for cutting taxes streamlining government and reducing the size of the state employee workforce. We're cutting seventy nine million dollars by eliminating almost two thousand state jobs and by downsizing age all of the other was nineteen hundred twenty seven jobs to be cut. About a third of those are vacant now. The other two thirds are filled. But we can handle about half of that is by using retirements and attrition. The state job cuts are just a part of Hunt's overall plan to cut spending by 200 million dollars and proposes to save that money by among other things reducing and reorganizing the Department of Public Instruction eliminating the Department of Crime Control and Public Safety reducing faculty staff and administrative equipment within the University of North

Carolina system and having every state agency reduce its budget by an average of two percent. The spending cuts would help finance a three hundred forty three million dollar tax cut this year and a 2 percent pay raise for teachers and state workers. Money would also be spent to reduce class size in North Carolina's public schools and to provide additional prison space. Governor Hunt's proposal to cut un city's budget by upwards of 20 million dollars has already drawn a reaction from the president of the University of North Carolina system CD Spangler voiced his objections to Hunt's budget proposal. At today's emerging issues forum he said that the university system has contributed greatly to the economic development of the state and to the success of ventures like the Research Triangle Park which never required tech support from the state. Instead the state invested deliberately in a university system. University in turn became a great magnet for brains and for industry making that our success that

is today and the envy of people all across the nation. I can show you that any effort on any person's part to reduce funding for our great university would at best be misguided and that worst would be destructive of the economic engine of our state. Hunt's plan to cut the US the budget include reducing non teaching faculty at the universities by 4.7 million dollars reducing protected positions by ten point four million reducing 3.8 billion dollars worth of administrative equipment at USC and reducing the subsidy to USC hospitals at Chapel Hill by one point two million dollars. The plan also calls for 3.1 percent increase in in-state tuition and a 10 percent tuition increase for out-of-state students. The Small Business Administration opened offices in the western part of the state today to help those who suffered flood damage during last month's storms disaster loan applications are being processed at

offices in Yancey County. McDowell County and Madison County as well as in Goldsboro. Some North Carolina prison inmates are now being held in Rhode Island will be transferred to Tennessee and the result will be a big cost savings for our state. Rhode Island charges North Carolina about seventy one dollars a day for each of the two hundred thirty two inmates that houses in April the charge will increase to $85 a day. Those inmates were moved to Rhode Island because of North Carolina's prison overcrowding. Tennessee plans to do the job for $55 a day and is even offering to pick up the tab to transport the prisoners from Rhode Island monitoring stations are being set up at Lake walk a mile and at Lake Phelps in Washington County to check levels of toxic mercury. State officials want to know if air pollution affecting streams and lakes is causing the mercury found in increasing numbers of fish. Air monitors will be installed this month which can detect the source of mercury particles routine fish testing late last year found dangerous mercury levels in streams in the coastal plains.

Today the skies were cloudy in the mountains and partly cloudy across the rest of the state. It only got up to 27 degrees in the northern mountains. But elsewhere temperatures range from the mid 30s to the mid 40s. Tonight it'll remain cloudy in the mountains and more clouds will move into the Wilmington area as well. There it will only get down into the low 30s lows around Boone will be in the teens and everywhere else it'll be in the mid 20s. Tomorrow expect cloudy skies and high temperatures mostly in the mid 40s profits for North Carolina farmers are not increasing. Even though farmers are producing more. That's according to a report compiled by economists at North Carolina State University. The point of the report entitled North Carolina farm income projections indicates that production costs are increasing but farmers are not getting higher prices for their commodities. The report estimates the North Carolina farmers

grossed a six point three billion dollars in commodities last year. That's up by two hundred million dollars from the previous year. But the net farm income was estimated at less than 2.5 billion dollars down twenty four million dollars from 1993 livestock and poultry farmers saw better sales and production last year while sales for tobacco growers fell slightly. Livestock receipts also were lower than projected because of the sharp drop in hog prices in late 1994. Carolina Panthers owner Jerry Richardson denies reports that he may have helped get federal grants to build the team's training camp stadium the stadium will be built at Richardson's all mater Wofford College in Spartanburg South Carolina. The Panthers will train there 24 days a year to help finance the 2.1 million dollar stadium Walford has won a $500000 federal grant and a $750000 grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission. Spartanburg County is in the 13th state economically depressed area that the Appalachian commission

serves. However the county have the state's fourth lowest unemployment rate and one of the state's highest per capita incomes in December. An aide to former Governor Carroll Campbell says that Richardson and school officials initiated the idea of getting grant money to build the stadium. RJ Reynolds Tobacco has won the right to make and sell its brand name cigarettes in Vietnam RJR own 7 percent of a new firm that will enter a joint venture with the dunning cigarette factory in Vietnam. The Winston-Salem based cigarette maker will be the first American firm authorized to invest in the factory RJR is expected to grow tobacco for six years in Vietnam before producing as many as 165 million packages of camel. Winston Moore and Salem brand cigarettes each year RJR is also expected to export cured leaves from Vietnam. The venture is valued at more than 21 million dollars. The stock market with some US somewhat mixed today. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 15 points to close at thirty nine fifty four

point twenty one gainers lead decliners by a narrow margin. Trading was light as 255 million shares changed hands. The Standard Poor's 500 index was ahead fractionally and the Nasdaq composite index lost a point. And now for some stocks of North Carolina interest. Well let's head back to the North Carolina Museum of Art where the celebration of the emerging issues forms

10th anniversary is taking place. That's where Audrey Cates Bailey is Audrey. I'm back again Mary Lou with another special guest the sound we have Governor Jim Hunt whose idea it was to begin the emerging issues former governor. Did you have any idea when it began that it would become the tremendous success it has become in the past 10 years. I really did not. We thought it would be exciting and very worthwhile for our state to have something like this. But to get to the place 10 years later when you've had a presence in the United States and the site is just in the head of the Federal Reserve and former presidents and the top business leaders in the world and all of the kinds of things we've had here nobody expected this to happen but we're excited that that it's happening here in North Carolina and tonight with David Gergen giving the dinner answer Matthew again brought in another leader in politics and in journalism. Yes. Well our Each year we end we journey talk about competitiveness things things that will make

America attractive and competitive in the world. And each year we eat we simply aim to bring in the very best minds of very best people who are leaders in these fields who can share that with the people of our state with our decision makers and the audience is made up of some of the very best thinkers and leaders that we have. Now changing gears a little bit you leave tomorrow on this trade mission to Mexico what do you hope to achieve. Well we're going to Mexico because we believe it's good for North Carolina workers who will be participating in a textile trade show North Carolina products made by our workers furniture trade show again North Carolina furniture made by our workers. We're going to be opening a North Carolina office to push more trade in Mexico so we'll have more jobs here. The pesos having a rocky time right now but they'll recover from that. And we want to be the ones who are making the things that go down there that they'll be buying in the future so it's an exciting time for our state and we're working as hard as we can for more good jobs good luck on your mission and I hope it is a success.

Our own Mary Lou Hardtalk will be joining you for the trip. Thank you we're delighted that WNC TV is going to be with us in Mexico. Thank you very much Governor. All right Mary Lou. That's it. They're ringing the bell for dinner so we'll have to sign off now. Thank you Andrea hope you enjoy your dinner and thanks to the crew there at the museum as well. We also want to let you know that you and CTV will air a one hour special on the emerging issues for this Sunday February 19th and that's at 6:00 pm. Recently now producers Billy Barnes America's star took a trip to Mount Airy North Carolina. And what they brought back was the amazing story of the original Siamese twins you know the North Carolina Foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. If you had walked along the snow about the year 1850 you might have seen a strange sight. Two men so close together they appeared to be hugging each other as they dug a hole for a fence post or drove a hay wagon or planted tobacco. Those two hardworking

farmers probably were the most famous North Carolinians of the entire 19th century. They were never apart. Always together. And that togetherness was both their fortune and their curse. The people of Surrey County knew these close knit brothers as Aine and Chang Bunker. The world knew them as the original Siamese twins. Ang and Chang were born in 1811 in Bangkok so I am handsome active intelligent boys whose only abnormality was a connection to each other from one belly button to the other by a five inch long flexible cord of flesh and ligament. When they were a teen an enterprising Scottish traveller talked to Queen's mother into letting him take the boys away. For ten years they travelled through America and Europe. Back then many towns had a little auditorium for appearances by travelling singers actors and orators. I think young twins were a smash hit. They appeared in

formal attire delighted audiences with their display of acrobatics musicianship tales of their travels and their lives together. They gave Frank dignified answers to questions from the audience during their journeys they crisscrossed North Carolina many times in a glass case in the North Carolina collection on the university campus at Chapel Hill. There's an ancient diary kept by the Twins showing their expenses in the fifth year of their travels. October 15. Chapel Hill missus nuns tavern and boarding house. One night's lodging ten meals six dollars twenty five cents. Years later while traveling through northwestern North Carolina they stopped for a rest. We worry of hotels and coaches and trains and a thousand auditoriums. They decided to settle in this sweet land they built this stout bachelor home and moved in. Then Cupid struck at a neighbor's wedding celebration they met and fell in love with sisters

Sally and Adelaide Yates. Soon the four were married and happy in the former Bachelor house and within two years there were four children. Their starter home still stands in the Wilkes County community of trap Hill and it's still occupied. It was a special place with extra wide staircase to accommodate the twins who necessarily had to walk side to side. But there was trouble in paradise. Too many cooks spoil the broth and after nine years of this awesome togetherness a worrisome who's in charge kind of rivalry made life difficult. They solve the problem by building two new homes on separate farms. This is the home built in 1857 by Chang. The twins would live for three days here at Changs house then hitch up the wagon and drive to NGs for a three day stay. The wives remained in their own homes. The Eng Bunker house burned in 1956. Today there's nothing much left except some old stone steps that lead to a basement where the twins

bodies were hidden for a time because of threats to steal and exhibit them. Dorothy hay more a great granddaughter of ingroup up in the Eng Bunker house. The crew have they oh they're calling her the corn quaver we built. Mother built another half over the side and I with a bass that. You can go into the basement of this house and find the stairwell that went down to the base. In which the twins were hidden. I can remember grandpa telling about a time when they were on a roof working our roof and I had a fight and one threatens to knock the other one off. I also remember grandpa telling a story of when his daddy was given him a whipping and Chang reached over he says that's enough now.

That's when that the civil war left the twins destitute. During the war they had to accept Confederate money for their crops and now it was worthless paper. Sadly they packed their bags and went on the road again to make enough money to get back on their feet. Between them they had 21 children to care for. Tomorrow evening on North Carolina now we will present the final chapters in the life of the Siamese twins and to meet some of their distinguished December. As Billy said we'll have part two of the twin story tomorrow night and Nova will have a special on Siamese twins tomorrow night at 8 o'clock here on UN CTV. We want to keep in touch with you so simply call our viewer comment line at 9 1 9 5 4 9 7 8 0 8. Or write us at Box 1 4 9 0 0 2 7 7 0 9. You can fax a message to 9 1 9 5 4 9 7 0 4 3. Or try our Internet address at 8 0 0 0 0

dot com and please give us a daytime phone number in case we need to follow up. Now tomorrow night Bob Garner will have a wrap up of the emerging issues for him Plus we'll show you part two of the story about NG and sharing the Siamese twins. And a treat for Valentine's Day tomorrow. We'll go on location to the North Carolina theaters production of the musical My Fair Lady. It will be opening night for that show and more a lot of tourism in Raleigh. We'll speak with the artistic director of the production Terrence Mann. Now for the rest of the week members of the now team will be hosting the show as I head down to Mexico with Governor Jim Hunt's trade mission videographer Jerome Moore and I will present a series of reports on that next week so I'll see you in a week. That's all for now. At iOS. You're wrong

on that one.