For Mike Theiss, the merchandise manager at the Carrier Dome, everything was business as usual Sunday morning as he readied for Syracuse University’s 149th Commencement.

Then former-President Bill Clinton decided he wanted some SU basketball gear.

‘Secret Service took care of everything,’ said Theiss, who was at the Orange Shoppe near Clinton’s green room when the president asked to be let in the store, which was not open yet.

An agent approached the manager as Clinton wandered about.

‘The president is getting some things, is that OK?’ the agent asked.

Clinton sported his newly acquired championship hat as he processed into the Dome with Chancellor Kenneth A. Shaw to address the nearly 5,000 students graduating. In a speech sprinkled with sports and political references, Clinton encouraged the graduates to make sacrifices to become involved in public service.

‘Your generation, to be fair, has gotten a bum rap,’ Clinton said. This generation of graduates does more community service than previous young Americans, he said.

‘But whether it is because you’re turned off by the press coverage or by the insurmountable nature of the problems, you are less likely to vote and participate in politics than previous generations of young Americans,’ he said.

Clinton urged graduates to make the distinction between trends and headlines. The headlines often play up issues that truly aren’t reflective of trends, Clinton said. As a citizen, graduates should worry about the trends, not the headlines.

When undergraduates came to Syracuse in 1999, the economy was strong, and there was progress toward peace in areas such as the Middle East. In the four passing years, students saw the Sept. 11 attacks, a war on terror and the fall of many high-tech companies, he said.

But those problems have always existed. The headlines just didn’t point them out.

‘In 1999, we had the dangers of terror and weapons of mass destruction it’s just that they weren’t in the headlines because they hadn’t happened here,’ Clinton said.

Now the headlines are filled with stories of terrorists and the severe acute respiratory syndrome. All of those fears affect the economy and political systems of the world, Clinton said. He has already seen it in Chinatown in New York City, where the economy was hit because of SARS scares. ‘As if, if you’re Chinese anywhere, you might be carrying SARS,’ he said.

If the graduates aren’t paralyzed by fear and can make the distinction between the headlines and the trend lines, they can prevail and be successful, Clinton said.

That message, though filled with political talk, was heard and well-said, said Marissa Scott, an international relations masters graduate.

‘Any political person who makes a speech at a university is going to be political,’ Scott said.

Scott was one of 19,608 graduation attendees, SU spokesman Kevin Morrow said. That number was about 3,000 more than last year’s commencement when former-New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani spoke.

Shaw conferred 4,875 degrees during the two-hour ceremony. The State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry, which shared the ceremony with SU, graduated 497.

Published on May 10, 2003 at 12:00 pm