Now She Tells Us
USA
Today leads with the Treasury Department's announcement that in the
wake of last week's hearings, the IRS will hold monthly open houses with
taxpayers. The Washington Post goes with the revelation that in more than
100 murder cases, the D.C. police ignored high-quality leads supplied by
federal cops. The New York Times
goes with Republican doubts about the prospects for President Clinton's
fast-track trade bill, and the Los Angeles
Times leads with the House's refusal to allow the Census Bureau to use
modern statistical methods in the 2000 census.
The USAT IRS lead reports that the open houses for taxpayers with
grievances will be monthly Saturday sessions running from 9 to 5. The paper
points out that the new measure is part of the Clinton administration's plan to
avoid the perception that it is too protective of the agency. Another possible
development, says USAT , is that Clinton might propose a major overhaul
of the tax system.
The NYT and WP fronts don't mention the open houses. Nor does
the Wall Street Journal "Tax Report." On its front, the
LAT has only a tiny box "reefer" pointing to the story deep inside.
According to the NYT lead, the Republican leaders of the House and
the Senate say that the president's fast-track bill for negotiating global
trade accords is in trouble in Congress and it's his fault because he hasn't
brought along enough Democrats, many of whom are opposed to new trade bills
that don't include stiff labor and environmental provisions. Administration
officials tell the paper they see the Republican comments mostly as a
negotiating tactic for wringing more concessions out of Clinton on other issues
in return for saving the legislation.
The LAT census lead says that the House's vote against allowing
sampling techniques in the census might ensure an inaccurate count and cost
California a billion dollars in lost revenue. But the piece doesn't adequately
explain the Republican animus against sampling. The reason is the fear that,
for the purposes of reapportionment and federal revenue distribution, the
techniques will help Democrats artificially inflate the numbers of
traditionally Democratic minorities and city dwellers, who are hard to reach by
traditional head-counting methods.
Both the NYT and LAT fronts report that the French Roman
Catholic Church apologized yesterday to the Jewish people for its silence in
the face of French collaboration with the Holocaust. The NYT states that
the apology was "an expression of remorse more complete, uncompromising and
anguished than anything previously pronounced by the church."
A good example of using reporting to break through the generalities of a
policy issue is the WSJ 's front-page piece about the agony of
administrators trying to decide which children should lose their disability
payments under the tough new welfare law. Nationwide, the story says, 125,000
children with various developmental and emotional problems must be denied the
payments.
Both the NYT and WP have inside stories about how New York Lt.
Gov. Elizabeth "Betsy" McCaughey Ross announced yesterday that she was now
proud to call herself a Democrat. Ross had already been yanked off the 1998
gubernatorial ticket by Gov. George Pataki. Her perceived inexperience and
uncontrollability alienated not just him, but also most other leading
Republicans in the state, including Sen. Alfonse D'Amato. Ross had never held
elective office before and got the nod mostly on the strength of her New
Republic cover story savaging Bill Clinton's health care reform plan, which
was widely credited with helping to sink it.
After her announcement, Ross took a "welcoming" phone call from Bill
Clinton. The White House says health care reform didn't come up.
