Roll, Jordan, Roll
USA
Today leads with Kofi Annan's politically-loaded cancellation of a trip
to Washington. The Washington Post goes with the weekend call by several
Clinton allies for Kenneth Starr to abandon his Whitewater inquiry. The
New York Times
leads with the first big test for the balanced budget--the pork-lined
transportation bill. And the Los Angeles Times leads with another in its series
of important stories on the L.A. County Sheriff's Department--this time it's
news of a major bribery scheme involving food contracts for the county
jail.
Kofi Annan was, says USAT , to be in Washington today to meet with
President Clinton and "bask in praise for ending the threat of war with Iraq."
But, U.N. officials told the paper, he postponed his trip after Sen. Trent
Lott, who last week harshly criticized the deal Annan brokered with Iraq, said
he didn't have time to meet with him. (Idea for editors: report on Lott's
schedule for this week. It would be interesting to see how many fundraisers and
meetings with lobbyists he manages to fit in.)
The WP lead notes that on weekend yap shows, White House advisor Rahm
Emmanuel and Sen. Patrick Leahy called on Starr to wind up Whitewater, and that
three Republican senators also expressed guarded criticism of him. Emmanuel
stopped short of saying Starr should resign, but Leahy said, "Sure he should,"
adding that he is "totally out of control." The paper reports that over the
weekend Arlen Specter, John McCain and Orrin Hatch each questioned Starr's
calling in Sidney Blumenthal to question him in front of a grand jury about his
press contacts. The idea that Starr has blown it is explored in a large piece
inside the Times and was also the subject of an LAT front-pager
on Sunday.
The NYT notes that the transportation bill before the Senate is such
a big challenge to the balanced budget because it provides goodies to every
congressional district in the country. The piece points out that among those
who want to make sure the bill doesn't eat into any budget surplus is Newt
Gingrich. The Times also notes that the bill raises several partisan
side issues that could lead to a confrontation with the White House, namely,
proposals to delay new clean air regulations, scale back affirmative action
hiring on highway projects, and lower wage levels for transportation project
workers.
The Wall Street Journal front page tells the story of how four
years after the FAA announced its intent to create a $500 million system for
allowing commercial aircraft to use military Global Positioning satellites for
navigation, the system is nowhere near in place. In fact, says the
Journal , the system might end up costing $14 billion. And the FAA would
have to keep paying for the current, conventional system until every airline
had switched over. Meanwhile, last year, there were 225 near-misses over the
U.S., up 22 percent from the year before.
The Journal also reports on the trend of professional sports teams
offering player education programs in an attempt to keep their new
millionaires out of trouble. The programs typically cover how to handle
gamblers, groupies and...salad forks. The most elaborate example, run by
baseball's Texas Rangers, even includes role-playing bimbos, and is
euphemistically called the "Career Development Program."
USAT 's off-lead reports that, rumors to the contrary, Vernon Jordan,
who is scheduled to appear before the Starr grand jury on Tuesday, has not
requested immunity from prosecution. Jordan's lawyer also told the paper there
is no rift between his client and Bill Clinton.
"Military rock and roll is to rock and roll as..." The WP reports
that Gen. George T. Babbitt, head of the Air Force Materiel
Command at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, recently jammed
with the Ventures, a band he helped form in the late 1950s.
