RUST COMMENTARY: MARK YOUR CALENDARS NOW FOR INAUGURATION WEEK IN APRIL

It's a few weeks off (April 4-12), but it's not too early to put the Inauguration Week events for Southeast Missouri State University President DALE NITZSCHKE on your schedule ... as many could sell out.

But most important is the excitement the upcoming events and personalities are generating on the campus. The following editorial from the Feb. 12 issue of the CAPAHA ARROW university newspaper is one any president would be proud of (dangling participle ... but how better can it be said?):

Southeast will be visited by many prominent people during the week of President Dale Nitzschke's inauguration.

Bill Cosby, Maya Angelou, William F. Buckley, former senators Paul Simon and George McGovern -- these are some of the more famous people who will be speaking on campus during the week. Southeast will be the center of a great deal of attention and envy.

The Inauguration Committee should be proud of its efforts. They have managed to plan numerous events with big-name people. The committee has made it an exciting time to be part of the campus community. This kind of activity is a once-in-a-lifetime event, and everyone on campus should take advantage of it.

Furthermore, President Nitzschke should feel honored, but this honor wouldn't be called for if it weren't deserved. President Nitzschke has made outstanding efforts to remind everyone that the reason the university exists is the students, and it's obvious he really cares for the students. He has also helped start the task of lifting campus morale.

The week of President Nitzschke's inauguration will be a much-anticipated celebration. The Arrow anxiously looks forward to the week's activities, because the staff knows this is going to be one of the most thrilling events to occur at Southeast for a long time.

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Wally Lage and I spent two days in Jefferson City last week for MISSOURI PRESS DAY, the MISSOURI CHAMBER LEGISLATIVE DAY ... and a meeting of the Missouri daily newspapers.

I attended the hearing on SEN. PETER KINDER's partial-birth abortion bill. The testimony to prohibit partial birth abortions (except the rare necessity to save the life of the mother) was so convincing and the opposition's so weak ... one hearing the two would not have hesitated to vote as the committee unanimously did ... 8 to 0 for Kinder's bill.

The governor's position was that it is already illegal and that current Missouri law makes it second-degree murder. The first time I'd heard this position was in answer to a luncheon question of the governor the day of the hearing.

However, the administration's spokesperson was not able to cite the statute which made it illegal, nor would she say that they supported the bill since it did what they said already couldn't legally be done under current law (thus as the chairman said you must support the bill) which brought a silent response.

That was Wednesday of last week. On Friday GOVERNOR CARNAHAN says he might consider signing a bill outlawing partial-birth abortion -- If the measure includes language he wants.

But the sponsor, Senator Kinder, responded to The Associated Press that the pro-choice governor is playing politics.

Kinder's bill makes it a misdemeanor to perform the late-term abortion procedure. The bill also declares it to be second-degree murder if the baby fully emerges from the womb and then is killed by the physician.

The only exception to partial-birth abortion is when it is performed to save the mother's life.

Carnahan says if Kinder includes the mother's health as another exception in his bill, he might sign it.

This was PRESIDENT CLINTON'S position which potentially makes partial-birth abortions legal, because alleged mental or health reasons can be loosely interpreted by those not wanting any prohibition on abortion. Too bad this issue has become a political pawn.

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I heard a presentation of the MISSOURI TOTAL TRANSPORTATION COMMISSION which expects to come up with a proposal by May of this year (original target was December 1996). This group will state the goals and funding possibilities (more taxes, expanding the constitutional restriction to spend gas tax money on more than highways and bridges etc.)

The delayed timing becomes interesting with the rumored possibility of a special legislative session this fall.

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Dollars are the fuel of government for those who seek them for their pet projects. Few praise those who want to defeat state tax increases and then leave the money in the hands of the taxpayer and his direct participation in local projects (such as Cape's current school proposal, which I strongly support).

Like the new desegregation school funding proposal to redistribute money to the "poorer school districts" (an estimated 70 percent would go to St. Louis and Kansas City) the Total Transportation Commission will try to raise funds and do likewise.

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And to borrow PAUL HARVEY'S line ... here's the rest of the story on the ABC FOOD LION "hit":

ABC producer: "I'm worried" about Food Lion story

Much hypocritical hollowness lies behind the defiant public stance ABC News is taking in the aftermath of a $5.5 million damage verdict for its sloppily reported story on the Food Lion grocery chain. We have evidence from within the files of ABC News that shows network executives were skittish about the planned expose even before two women producers were dispatched on undercover missions as deli clerks in Food Lion stores. These doubts are contained in a memorandum dated April 1, 1992, that ABC grudgingly surrendered to lawyers for Food Lion during discovery for the law suit. It was written by producer Susan Barnett and it recounted her conversation with two superiors.

Susan Barnett was a new face at ABC News, working on her first major story. So she laid out her qualms in a for-the-record memorandum. She wrote, "They (Barzilay and Porges) said they were worried we would find small violations here and there and make it into a big problem that it is not. I agreed. ..." So Miss Barnett talked with Ira Rosen, the executive producer of "PrimeTime Live," where the Food Lion segment eventually aired. Her memo continued, "Ira said don't worry about it. Just shoot everything, collect all stuff and bring it to New York; editorialize later." Her memorandum ended, "I'm worried."

Let's recapitulate this remarkable document. People in the network feared even at this early stage that "small violations" -- their words, not ours -- would be blown up into a "big problem" -- again, ABC's words, not ours. Nonetheless, the man running the show says go ahead anyway -- get material and "editorialize later," which is a journalist's way of saying, "We are going to make a story out of whatever you bring back."

The rest, as they say, is history. Much of the supposed misconduct depicted in Food Lion stores came from Miss Barnett and fellow producer Lynn Dale. For instance, ABC showed a dirty meat saw. Why was it dirty? Because Susan Barnett hadn't washed it, as a supervisor had told her to do. And who extended the shelf life of some meat beyond the expiration date? Lynn Dale of ABC, as outtakes of the women's video footage revealed.

Roone Arledge, the president of ABC News, whined that the Food Lion segment was intended to protect customers from spoiled foods; that "if large corporations were allowed to stop hard-hitting investigative journalism, the American people would be the losers." Mr. Arledge skipped around several points that would have embarrassed his network:

-- The Food Lion story was hand fed to ABC by the United Food and Commercial Workers, a union which failed miserably in repeated attempts to organize Food Lion workers. Embarrassed in failure, the union launched a retaliatory "corporate campaign" against Food Lion. Thomas McNutt, A UCFW official, told Regardie's, a Washington business magazine, in July 1988, that the union's goal was to "bleed" Food Lion economically "until they either agree to do business ... or are forced out of business.

-- According to depositions taken by Food Lion lawyers, a UCFW publicist named Neel Lattimore pitched a story abut Food Lion to ABC producer Lynn Dale on Nov. 20, 1991. Lattimore is now press secretary to First Lady Hillary Clinton; Food Lion lawyers suggest he is to have "interesting hours" in the witness chair when a racketeering suit against the union comes to trial later this year. Concurrently, ABC was urged to attack Food Lion by a group called the Government Accountability Project, an off-shoot of the far-left Institute of Policy Studies.

-- ABC never revealed that a hostile union inspired the Food Lion story. Dianne Sawyer, "PrimeTime Live"'s talking-head gave fleeting credit to the Government Accountability Project, but did not mention the union. According to admissions in depositions, the UFCW provided ABC with every hostile interviewee shown on the air.

-- So, about the "public interest" motivation? ABC showed no urgency in warning the public about the claimed health hazards. Miss Dale did not submit a story proposal until March 16. She and producer Barnett went undercover in April. Their story did not air until Nov. 5, 1992 -- a few days less than a year after the original tip, during "sweeps week," when ratings can boost or hurt network advertising rates.

Despite their claims about "health hazards" at Food Lion, outtakes show the ABC crews buying the chain's deli food for lunch during their investigation. Rump roasts and steaks they purchased to photograph were donated to local food banks. Even Miss Sawyer conceded on the air that no food poisoning had ever been linked to Food Lion.

Why doesn't the media report the provenance of ABC's Food Lion story, and its many flaws? The pretrial evidence, many thousands of pages, was readily available for any reporter who asked for it. But reporters are too lazy to read any document longer than a two-page press release. As a result, ABC's journalistic malpractice is being cast as First Amendment bravery. In a word: bosh! -- Accuracy in Media.

~Gary Rust is president of Rust Communications, which owns the Southeast Missourian and other newspapers.