News digest
White House deserts
Social Security freeze
WASHINGTON — The White
House abandoned consideration of a
one-year freeze on Social Security
benefits Monday after an outcry from
senior citizens and congressional
Democrats. A more likely move tocut
the deficit now seems higher taxes on
Social Security benefits to the well
off.
As Clinton continued to struggle
with elements of his deficit-reduction
package, he declared a short-term
stimulus package nearly complete.
He also moved to extend a related
program that provides extra benefits
for unemployed workers.
Saying hard times remain despite
improved economic slatistics.Clinton
-44
There are now 3
million jobs less in
this economy than
there would be if we
were in a normal
recovery.
-Clinton
-99 "
During a picture-taking session
with his economic advisers, Clinton
said he had made most of the majoi
decisions on the economic stimulus
_i__ _ i j___l
it earlier said it was considering — a
one-year freeze on cost-of-living in
creases for Social Security recipients.
That proposal was denounced by
senior citizens and Democratic law
makers. )
“I think it’s very unlikely it’s some
thing the president wants todo,” White
House Communications Director
George Stephanopoulos said Mon
day. Earlier, he had said the freezewas
one of a number of items on the table.
“That’s something he never wanted
to do,” Stephanopoulos said.
A more likely option is raising
taxes on Social Security benefits paid
to the well-off.
It and thecost-of-living freeze were
reportedly the two main items under
review in terms of Social Security
changes in a program that Clinton has
said will mean “shared sacrifice.”
Retired couples with incomes
above S32,000—and individuals with
incomes above $25,000 - now must
pay income taxes on 50 percent of
their Social Security benefits.
Administration officials, speaking
on the condition of anonymity, said
that Clinton is considering increasing
that level to about 85 percent.
iiv wuuiu unvtu in a
to Congress on Feb. 17.
“We’re going to go back over it
one more time to refine it,” he said.
The unemployment-compensation
package is part of that stimulus pro
gram, which overall is expected to
cost about S31 billion, divided be
tween job-producing programs and
business tax breaks.
The deficit-reduction part of the
program that Clinton will outline at
the same time was not as well along as
the stimulus part. The administration
backed away entirely from a proposal
announced he would send Congress
legislation to prolong a program al
lowing the jobless to draw up to 26
weeks of unemployment benefits be
yond the 26 weeks in the basic law.
He coupled the extension with a
proposal to make it easier for perma
nently displaced workers to take ad
vantage of job-retraining services.
“There are now 3 million jobs less
in this economy than there would be if
we were in a normal recovery .“Clinton
said.
Rising early, retiring late,
this night owl rarely sleeps
WASHINGTON—AthisCabi
net retreat, it was late-night bowl
ing and an early morning prayer
service. A White House reception
for visiting governors ran past mid
night, yet President Clinton invited
several for a pre-dawn jog in a
freezing rain.
Does
this guy ever
sleep?
Indeed
he does,
promises
White House
press secre
tary Dec Dec
Myers. Just
•; *>•- not much.
“He doesn’t need a lot of sleep,”
Myers says.
And she ought to know. Cam
paign veterans like Myers have long
known Clinton is a night owl.
What’s new, however, is that as
president he’s trying to be an early
bird, too.
History will note the pattern
began on Day One.
It was nearly 4 a.m. the morning
after his inauguration when Clinton
ended his round of visits to inaugu
ral balls and began his first night’s
sleep in the White House.
Just a few hours later he was
greeting visitors at a White House
open house, and his baggy eyes
didn’t go unnoticed.
One woman said hello and told
Clinton he looked exhausted. But
Clinton assured her, “I’ll gel a good
night’s sleep tonight.”
He didn’t.
That night, Zoe Baird’s nomi
nation as attorney general died in
a storm of protest over her hiring
of illegal aliens. Instead of getting
his sleep, Clinton was popping in
and out of aides’ offices well past
1 a.m. keeping track of the Baird
crisis.
It was a sign of things to come.
“I’m 24 years old and I’m hav
ing a hard time keeping up with
him,” said Andrew Friendly, an
aide to the 46-year-old president.
The odd working hours arc
partly a result of Clinton’s tight
day schedule of meetings and re
ceptions.
However, whether it’s work or
reading mysteries or play ing a com -
bative game of hearts, Clinton loves
to stay up late.
He hales, on the other hand,
gelling up early.
But he has no choice now.
His official day begins with a
national security briefing, usually
at 8:30 a.m.j
1 hHRAN, Iran — An Iranian air
liner with 132 people on board col
lided wilh an air force jel after Lakcoff
Monday from Tehran’s main airport
and exploded in a fireball as it plum
meted into a military compound. There
were no survivors.
The leased, Russian-piloted
Tupolev airliner was bound for the
northeastern Shiite Muslim holy city
of Mashhad, and most of its 119 Ira
nian passengers were pilgrims. The
crew of 13 included a Russian pilot
and four other Russians. No other
foreigners were on board, aviation
authorities said.
The Russian-designed Sukhoi
fighter was taking part in an exercise
to mark Air Force Day, when 14 years
ago its command pledged allegiance
to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s
Islamic Revolution — the first armed
force to do so.
Authorities gave no information
about the crew of the fighter, but
Iran's official Islamic Republic News
Agency reported the pilot and co
pilot also were believed killed.
IRNA reporter Saitar Oudi, who
saw the accident as he drove to work
at Mehrabad Airport, said the jetliner
was about 1,300 feet high when the
collision occurred at 10:15 a.m.
“The airplane was just taking off
Standards becoming fuzzy for public servants
WASHINGTON — Smoking marijuana
spelled doom for a Supreme Court nominee but
it couldn’t derail the nation’s first Baby Boom
president. Hiring an illegal alien scuttled two
attorney general hopefuls — even one who
never broke the law.
Just how and when ethical standards will be
applied to public servants is a fuzzy matter.
Should Americans expect perfection from their
highest officials?
“We seem to lurch back and forth between
what we consider sort of appropriately in the
public purview and what we consider private,”
’ said Jean Elshtain, a professor of political
science and philosophy at Vanderbilt Univer
sity. “Sometimes we’re forgiving, and some
times we’re not.”
President Clinton’s first attorney general
nominee, Zoe Baird, knowingly broke the law
when she employed illegal aliens to take care of
her children.
Most legal experts believe that rightfully
disqualified her from the post of attorney gen
eral.
“I think most Americans expect fairly high
standards in their elected officials,” said Robert
Royal, vice president of the Ethics and Public
Policy Center in Washington. “But in the Jus
tice Department, we have an expectation that
they should be above average, if not impec
cable. After all, an attorney general is sort of
like a police officer or captain.”
But many say the case is much less clear
against Kimba Wood, who withdrew Friday
after being talked up as Clinton’s likely choice.
She had hired an illegal alien but had broken no
laws.
“I think she basically got caught in the
crossfire after a legitimate question was raised
about Zoe Baird,” said Ronald N. Green, direc
tor of the Ethics Institute at Dartmouth College.
“It was her misfortune.”
Ethical considerations arc murkier still for
other political jobs.
The easy confirmation of Commerce Secre
tary Ronald H. Brown, a former well-con
nected lobbyist, is an example of how strangely
Americans apply their ethical codes, Elshtain
said.
“Let’s call it' the Ron Brown problem,’”she
said. “Here is a person with a million-dollar
handshake and a nice red carpet connecting his
corporate life to his government life. But people
don’t seem bothered.”
“My hunch is probably we’re almoslcynical
about the Ron Browns and other Washington
insiders. We’re used to it,” she said. “But when
it comes to women coming into these top slots
and issues being raised about how they raised
their children, that strikes home. People can
compare their own experiences and their own
lives.”
Still, Wood’s case is completely different
from Baird’s and she was treated very unfairly,
contends New York University Law School
professor Lea Brilmayer. “She didn’t break the
law. In fact, she paid the taxes on her domestic
help even though she must have known that the
chances of anyone finding out were very slim,’ ’
said Brilmayer. “It’s a very good statement of
her high ethical standards.”
“I think the people of the United States are
adult enough to be able to understand the
difference.’
I-World Wire-,
Walsh: Officials prepared to protect Reagan
WASHINGTON — Ronald
Reagan’s chief of staff and secre
tary of state had been prepared to
testify that his administration mis
stated facts about the Iran arms
sales to protect the president from
impeachment, the Iran-Contra pros
ecutor asserted Monday.
Special Prosecutor Lawrence
Walsh suggested in a report toCon
gress that Attorney General Edwin
Meese “was warn ing the president’s
advisers that to disclose the
president’s knowledge” of a 1985
missile shipment to Iran “would
expose him to a charge of illegal
activity.”
If Caspar Weinberger had gone
to trial, former White House chief
of staff Donald Regan was pre
pared to testify that he knew it was
untrue when Meese stated in a Nov.
24, 1986, White House meeting '
that the president hadn’t known
about the Hawk missile shipment,
Wakh said in an interim report to
COngress.
Regan “was concerned about
the possibility of impeachment,”
Walsh contended.
Gunman shoots and wounds 3 doctors
luj — r\ gunman
yelling for pain medicine shot and
critically wounded three doctors in
a hospital emergency room Mon
day, then took at least two hostages
and holed up in the building, au
thorities said.
The gunman entered the emer
gency room of Los Angeles County
University of Southern California
Medical Center at 12:40 p.m. and
opened fire on a group of doctors
sitting at a desk near the door,
hospital spokesman Harvey Kern
saiu.
Patient Hope Flynn said she
heard a man demanding pain medi
cation seconds before the shots rang
out.
The attacker then took at least
two hostages and was barricaded in
an isolated section of the emer
gency room, on the hospital’s first
floor, police Lt. John Dunkin said,
rhc area was cordoned off and
SW AT members were called in, he
said.
Iranian airliner collides with
air force jet; 132 people die
- it
The airplane was Just
taking off and the
fighter came from
the opposite side
and the two collided.
The airplane fell out
of the sky. It hit the
earth and exploded.
There was a very,
very terrible noise,
fire and smoke.
—Oudi
IRNA reporter
-ft -
and the fighter came from the oppo
site side and the two collided,” he
said. The airplane fell out of the sky.
It hit the earth and exploded. There
was a very, very terrible noise, fire
and smoke.”
The plane fell in an empty lot
inside a compound of Iran’s Revolu
tionary Guards Corps, 25 miles from
the center of the capital.
There were no casualties on the
ground, sentries at the base said.
The guards refused to allow non
military personnel into the fenced
compound, turning back even foren
sic experts. The guards said the wreck
age of Flight 962 and the bodies were
strewn over a 600-square-yard open
area inside their compound.
A group of anxious relatives gath
ered at the airport, most of them weep
ing into their hands.
A man in civilian clothes stood on
the roof of a military car to read the list
of victims. As he read each name,
cries and screams erupted from the
crowd. Some people collapsed.
“My sister, my sister. What a di
saster! What misery!” one woman
wailed as she banged her head against
the bars of a metal gate.
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