The Week October 16-22

By Kathleen Adams, Robertson Barrett, Michael D. Lemonick, Lina Lofaro, Michael Quinn, Alain L. Sanders and David Seideman

NATION

The Politics of Association

Trying to bolster the flagging campaigns of two Democratic heavyweights, President Clinton traveled to New York and Massachusetts and stumped for Governor Mario Cuomo and Senator Edward Kennedy, both of whom have apparently decided that the President's pariah status is nothing compared with theirs. "The fog is beginning to clear," proclaimed the hopeful President in Framingham, Massachusetts, as he urged voters to pull Democratic levers "for the agents of change, not for the agents of yesterday."

The Politics of Immigration

Republican California Governor Pete Wilson's re-election strategy hit an unexpected snag when former Housing Secretary Jack Kemp and former Education Secretary William Bennett made a big show of their opposition to California's popular ballot Proposition 187. Wilson has avidly supported the measure, which would bar illegal immigrants in the state from receiving public services. Kemp and Bennett lambasted it as a "fundamentally flawed, constitutionally questionable 'solution"' and castigated politicians who would use the issue of illegal immigration for political gain. Wilson shot back that the two "Washington" G.O.P. pols had hung around the capital "too long."

The Politics of Crime

Was it a calculated political ploy or a spontaneous burst of maternal anger? California pundits spent the week scratching their heads over whether Democratic underdog Kathleen Brown had helped or hurt her campaign to unseat Wilson by invoking a family tragedy. In a televised debate the week before, during which Wilson had continued to pound Brown as being soft on crime, she had thumped him back with this: "You cannot imagine what it's like to be a mother ... waiting for your daughter to come home in the evening and having her come home and comfort her because she's been raped ... You can't understand that, so don't question my commitment to be tough on crime." The next question: Did the revelation of her daughter's rape give Brown momentum, or did questions about the context of the revelation slow her down?

The Politics of Taunt

Florida Governor Lawton Chiles and Republican challenger Jeb Bush squared off in one of the most heated and taunt-ridden debates of this election season. From Bush: "I know the Governor gets all upset when I bring up my mama and ; daddy. He just can't handle that." And from Chiles: "I don't see where ... past service gives ((parents)) the opportunity to give one of their sons Texas and the other Florida." (George W. Bush, another son of the former President, is seeking the governorship of Texas.)

The Simpson Case

Judge Lance Ito spent much of the week doing legal pirouettes. After threatening to throw out key DNA blood tests because the prosecution may have taken too long to submit blood samples for analysis, Ito backed off and decided the tests should be admissible. Then, after having resumed the screening of prospective jurors, he decided to suspend the questioning temporarily. Reason: the need to ponder the impact of a sensational, allegedly tell-all book by a friend of Nicole Simpson's that accused O.J. of threatening his wife. Finally, Ito decided to reverse an order he had issued earlier in the week barring reporters from portions of the jury-selection process after defense attorneys dropped their opposition to the presence of the media.

Texas Submerged

Large swaths of southeastern Texas were deluged by torrential rain and widespread flooding. Pipelines burst under the roiling San Jacinto River, sending burning gasoline snaking downstream. At least 18 people lost their lives throughout the drenched region, and some 13,000 were chased from their homes.

Not-So-Crystal-Clear Water

The private non-profit Environmental Working Group released a study showing that traces of five commonly used agricultural weed killers are seeping through soil and streams and into the drinking water of some 14 million Americans, mostly in the Midwest. The poisons pose slightly increased cancer risks. The Environmental Protection Agency acknowledged there was cause for "concern" but not "alarm."

Fewer Coins in the Tin Cup

Though the '90s are often presented as a more caring decade than, say, the '80s, Americans are apparently giving less of their time and money to charitable causes. Independent Sector, a coalition of volunteer groups, reported that 3.4% fewer Americans volunteered last year than in 1991; during the same period, the average annual donation among the 73% of households that give slipped $19, to $880.

WORLD

More Peace in the Mideast

Jordan and Israel announced formal agreement on a peace treaty, the first such pact between Israel and an Arab nation since the treaty with Egypt in 1979. After 46 years in an official state of war, the reconciliation will boost commerce and facilitate travel between the two countries. President Clinton will join Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Jordan's King Hussein for the official signing ceremony on Wednesday on the border between the two countries.

More Terror in the Mideast

Seeking to undermine Israeli-Arab peacemaking, a suicide bomber from the Hamas organization of Palestinian Islamic militants detonated a package of tnt on a crowded bus in normally placid Tel Aviv; 21 people were killed. The especially grisly suicide attack came just days after the bloody denouement of a Hamas kidnapping in which two Israeli soldiers and three Palestinians died. Rabin vowed to crack down on Hamas suspects and urged Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to do the same.

Nuclear Buyout

After months of a tense standoff, the U.S. and North Korea reached a broad agreement that would freeze and then dismantle North Korea's declared nuclear program (but not, perhaps, all of the secret weapons program) and move the nations toward normal political and economic relations with each other for the first time. In return for the halt, the Clinton Administration and its allies will provide North Korea with two light-water reactors, worth an estimated $4 billion, as well as up to 500,000 tons of heavy oil a year. International inspectors will be allowed to monitor North Korea's declared nuclear sites to make sure the freeze is carried out, but it will be at least five years before they can inspect sites Washington suspects contain clues to the North's nuclear-weapons program.

Haiti's Smoother Ride

Jean-Bertrand Aristide pledged to appoint a Cabinet not only of the poor, whose cause he championed, but also of the wealthy elite -- the very people who helped oust him from power three years ago. A diverse government, he insisted, would prevent upheaval and ease the transition to democracy. Meanwhile, with the cost of gasoline soaring to $37.50 per gal. on the black market, the U.S. and Aristide signed a $15 million agreement to stabilize prices.

Kohl's Big Slide

Chancellor Helmut Kohl's 12-year-old governing coalition survived major losses in Germany's national election, clinging to a narrow majority in the parliament over the combined opposition. High unemployment, particularly in the country's eastern sector, and swelling public debt contributed to the Christian Democrats' drop in seats, from a 134-edge to just 10. American-style disillusionment with incumbents ran so rampant that former communists from East Germany, who now call themselves Democratic Socialists, won 30 seats.

Christmas Talks

The British government propelled the Northern Ireland peace process further by announcing that talks could start before Christmas. Calling the quiet of the Irish Republican Army's guns "more compelling than words," Prime Minister John Major explained that the seven-week-old cease-fire was enough for British officials to begin preliminary talks with Sinn Fein, the I.R.A.'s political wing. Major also lifted travel restrictions within Britain on two top Sinn Fein leaders and said all border crossings with the Republic of Ireland will be opened.

Saddam's Isolation

Saddam Hussein must have felt lonelier by the day last week as even somewhat friendly nations registered their disapproval of his aggressive behavior toward Kuwait. The United Nation's Security Council voted unanimously to condemn his actions. The Russian Foreign Minister, Andrei Kozyrev, who had tried to ease pressure on Iraq, said he did not want to "dramatize" the situation and affirmed that Washington and Moscow were in agreement on the need for full Iraqi compliance with U.N. resolutions. Finally, U.S. jets flew dry runs over Iraq as a forceful reminder of their heavy presence in the region.

Foreign Minister Surfaces

Rwanda's Foreign Minister, Jean-Marie Ndagijimana, who allegedly vanished in New York City earlier this month -- along with $187,000 in cash he had brought with him to finance the country's embassy in Washington and its United Nations mission -- surfaced in Paris. He denied taking the money. Rwandan officials at the U.N. claim that the mission is left with "zero" cash.

BUSINESS

GM's Flaming Pickups

After a two-year federal investigation of 4.5 million pickup trucks, Transportation Secretary Federico Pena accused General Motors of knowingly manufacturing defective trucks with exposed fuel tanks that can explode and burn in side-impact crashes. The Department of Transportation has scheduled a public hearing in December to decide whether the nation's No. 1 automaker should recall its line of pickups built between 1973 and 1987. In a 1988 redesign, GM moved the fuel tanks inside the trucks' protective body frames.

U.S. Probes NASDAQ

The Justice Department has launched an antitrust investigation of the dealers who make NASDAQ's stock markets, a move that will probably result in cutting their profit margins. The inquiry centers on possible price fixing in the spread between what investors pay and then sell stocks for on NASDAQ. As a result, Justice charges, the computer-trading system of NASDAQ, which bills itself as the "stock market for the next 100 years," gives big traders advantages over small investors.