News stories from Sunday May 28, 1978

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

California's university system, which set a national standard for quality and accessibility, faces a troubled future because of declining enrollments and changing attitudes toward college degrees. Not only are there fewer high school students, but there has also been a decline in those entering college. One reason is that a degree is no longer as valuable in the job market. [New York Times] The earth contains enough methane gas to provide energy indefinitely, an American physicist believes. Dr. Thomas Gold of Cornell University backs his surmise with a report from China that evil-smelling gas burst from the earth before a major earthquake in 1975. One witness saw gas bubbling in the bottom of a ditch. [New York Times] Senator Edward Brooke's re-election chances were being weighed from Cape Cod to the Berkshires after the Massachusetts Republican's admission last week that he had made a false statement under oath about a $49,000 loan. The outcome of the debate is expected to help decide how many additional candidates of both parties will oppose him in his attempt to win a third term. [New York Times] Seven cases of Legionnaire's disease have been confirmed in Bloomington, Ind., in the last five months. A state epidemiologist, Dr. Richard Telle, said three of the cases were fatal. All the victims were middle-aged men who had visited the city between January and March. Six were guests in the hotel section of the Indiana University Memorial Union. [New York Times] Washington is asking its allies in Western Europe to join the United States in what administration officials describe as one of the most ambitious joint defense programs since the establishment of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. [New York Times] Zbigniew Brzezinski accused Moscow of worldwide activities incompatible "with what was once called the code of detente." He called for "an international response" to Soviet and Cuban military intervention in Africa. It was one of the sharpest attacks en the Soviet Union by a high administration official in years. [New York Times] West Germany's Chancellor criticized Congress for refusing to lifts its arms embargo against Turkey. Helmut Schmidt, who is in this country to attend the special disarmament session of the General Assembly of the United Nations and a NATO meeting in Washington, said in a television interview that "the President of the United States in this regard is much wiser than the Congress." President Carter has asked Congress to lift the embargo. [New York Times] Chinese refugees from Vietnam tend to support Peking's charges that the Hanoi regime has harassed them, confiscated their property and forced many of them to "volunteer" to move to wild areas of the countryside. [New York Times] John Vorster demanded that Washington and London abandon their joint peace initiative in Rhodesia in favor of the accord worked out by Prime Minister Ian Smith and three moderate blacks, The South African leader's rejection was his first substantive response to a request for support of the plan from Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and Britain's Foreign Secretary, Dr. David Owen. [New York Times] A sudden lull in terrorism in Italy is puzzling the authorities. But though the Red brigades and other terrorist groups have been quiet for more than a week, they are expected to strike again. [New York Times]