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Horace Williams to become spaceport

CHAPEL HILL — The University of North Carolina announced today that it is dropping all plans for developing Carolina North into an academic campus and instead will convert Horace Williams Airport to an inter-galactic spaceport. UNC chancellor James Moeser said that continuing local opposition to the reconfiguring of the Horace Williams location as a mixed use research, educational and residential development had convinced the University administration to look to more "forward-thinking" uses for the property.

"We'll be grand-fathered in as an air transportation hub — if grand-fathered is the appropriate term to use for transitioning the facility to a 21st century inter-galactic launch and landing site."

According to Moeser, the new complex, which will feature a multi-use, space-themed conference center, will also be the "perfect place for UNC computer science students and other Carrboro residents to hold Star Trek meet-ups, conferences and conventions."

"We had considered offering the airport site to the Navy as an outlying landing field but University ornithologists had recommended against it, saying that there were neither the numbers nor types of birds appropriate for such a use, based on the previously proposed sites in migratory bird pathways in eastern North Carolina," said Moeser.

Duke University to drop football

DURHAM — Duke University will drop football, according to an internal report leaked to an investigative reporter for the Chapel Hill Herald, and this is likely to occur as soon as the first game of the upcoming season. Given the on-field record of Duke's football team over the last several decades, especially the last several seasons, the closest observers of college football were stunned to realize that they hadn't already.

"I had assumed that the reason that Duke had lost 20 games in a row was due to forfeits. I figured as little attention as Duke's athletic administration pays to football they had simply forgotten to inform their opponents for the last several seasons that they had dropped the sport," said Sports Radio 850 The Buzz Program Director Adam Gold.

When told of the report, Atlantic Coast Conference Commissioner John Swofford was quick to note that fielding a football team is a requirement for any school belonging to the ACC — which would mean that all Duke teams, including their men's basketball team, would be reduced to club sports.

Duke administrators were equally quick to quash the speculation that the leaked report had generated.

"Duke has not and is not terminating its football program," said President Richard Brodhead. "The portions of the report that were released did not reflect accurately the totality of its meaning." said Brodhead. "While I cannot deny that the report said 'Duke to drop football,' the context was a statistical analysis showing that given the rate of turnovers per game, it was highly likely that the team would fumble the ball multiple times in the first quarter of the first game of the season, not including botched extra- point attempts, if any."

Brodhead continued by saying that "Duke football is too important to Duke University to even consider dropping it," noting that in any given year up to one-third of Duke's medical students are former Duke football players.

Ex-Speaker says prosecution "racist"

RALEIGH — Deposed Speaker of the NC House of Representatives says that he was only prosecuted because he is Black.

Hybrid sales surge following arrest

Tokyo — Toyota Motor Corporation reports that sales of its hybrid-energy propelled Prius automobile surged 18% in a single week following a July 4 news report that Al Gore III, 24, was arrested in California for speeding. Al Gore was driving a blue Toyota Prius 100 mph on the San Diego Freeway when he was pulled over at 2:15 a.m., Sheriff's Department spokesman Jim Amormino said.

IN RELATED NEWS: NASCAR insiders say that they are considering adding a "Car of the Day After Tomorrow" division in addition to the Nextel Cup, which will feature only Toyota Prii. The Joe Gibbs Racing team is said to be currently in negotiation with Al Gore III as their lead driver.

Gary D. Gaddy is proud that his parents are one of America's few multiple Prius-owning

households and loves attending UNC-Duke football games at Wallace Wade Stadium where his seat is usually better than the ones he often gets given in the luxury boxes at Kenan.

A version of this article was published in the Chapel Hill Herald Thursday July 19, 2007.