Code blue

Free-market health care reform is in jeopardy; President Clinton said he would veto a House bill approved 267-151 March 28 because it contains provisions calling for medical savings accounts and limits on medical malpractice awards. House Speaker Newt Gingrich says he's prepared to drop the provisions because he wants Mr. Clinton to sign the core legislation: a new law guaranteeing workers access to health insurance when they change or lose their jobs, even if they have a pre-existing health problem. Republicans argue that without the reforms, many workers will not be able to afford insurance.

Freemen pinned

On March 25, Montana officials arrested LeRoy Schweitzer and Daniel Peterson Jr.-leaders of a local anti-government group called the Freemen-and charged them with scheming to defraud financial institutions and public agencies and with threatening a federal judge. Mr. Schweitzer and Mr. Peterson immediately began a hunger strike in protest. Meanwhile, about a dozen other Freemen-including women and children, and believed to be heavily armed-holed up on a 940-acre ranch near Jordan, Mont., beginning a drawn-out standoff with about 100 law enforcement officials; the group has been holed up on the ranch six months defying a government foreclosure against its owner, also a member of the Freemen, a group that refuses to pay taxes.

Fairy tales

Republican and Democratic lawmakers criticized President Clinton's decision to certify Mexico as fully cooperating in the war against illegal drugs. "This is never-never land," said Senate Banking Committee Chairman Alfonse D'Amato, a critic of last year's U.S.-led multi-billion dollar economic rescue of Mexico. Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein has co-sponsored with Sen. D'Amato legislation to bar further help to Mexico unless it does more to stop the flow of illegal drugs. Up to 70 percent of the cocaine and 50 percent of the marijuana in the United States comes through or from Mexico.

A smoking gun

Texas on March 28 joined six other states in suing the nation's tobacco companies for knowingly contributing to the smoking-related Medicaid expenses of treating the states' smoking-related illnesses.

Under conviction

An Israeli court found Yigal Amir guilty of the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and sentenced him to life imprisonment. Mr. Amir, 25, argued that his Nov. 4 crime was necessary to stop Mr. Rabin from handing over land to Palestinian rule under an accord signed in 1993 with the Palestine Liberation Organization. A final report on security failures leading to Mr. Rabin's murder held Shin Bet security chief Carmi Gilon "formally and personally responsible" for lapses that led to the assassination. In spite of threats by Jewish extremists, the report said, security officials allowed Mr. Amir to loiter 40 minutes in a parking lot near the prime minister without questioning him. Secretary of State Warren Christopher announced an aid package to the West Bank and Gaza Strip that could reach $100 million. The money is meant to compensate Palestinians who have lost jobs since Israel closed its border with the two areas after four suicide bombings killed 58 people in Israel.

Partially veto-proof abortion

The House March 27 passed by a veto-proof margin legislation barring an inch-from-infanticide method of abortion, but the Senate does not have the strength to override President Clinton's promised veto. The abortion method is an "offense to the conscience of mankind," said Rep. Charles Canady (R-Fla.), during debate on the measure. Known as partial-birth abortion, the procedure involves partially extracting a baby, legs first, then stabbing the infant at the base of the skull with medical scissors, widening the wound, and inserting a catheter to suction out the brain and collapse the skull, killing the child. Of the nation's 1.3 million officially counted abortions in 1993, about 13,300 were performed after the 21st week of gestation, according to the Centers for Disease Control. But nobody tracks how often the partial-birth abortion method is performed. An abortion industry group estimates it at 500 per year. The National Conference of Catholic Bishops purchased a full-page advertisement in the March 25 Washington Post criticizing Mr. Clinton's call for lawmakers to add an exception for cases of the mother's "health," an exception that because of legal precedent would allow the abortions for a variety of trivial reasons; such an exception would require the abortionist merely to record the reason. The ad read, "So, President Clinton, if you're trying to ease your conscience by agreeing to sign [the bill] with a 'health of the mother' exception, you should be aware. You'll be fooling nobody but yourself."

Pork knife

Making good on a "Contract with America" proposal, the House gave final approval March 28 to legislation that will give the president authority to cut specific budget items out of larger spending bills without having to veto the entire measure. The line-item veto gives presidents the power to stop pork-barrel spending or responsibility for letting it pass. The bill also allows the president to cancel tax benefits targeted to groups of 100 or fewer beneficiaries and eliminate spending for new entitlement programs that Congress might establish or additions to the food stamp program. Although President Clinton will sign the measure, it won't take effect until Jan. 1 because Mr. Clinton and his presidential opponent, Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, agreed not to make the law a campaign issue. With victories in California, Washington, and Nevada March 26, Sen. Bob Dole now says the battle for the Republican presidential nomination is over. He had actually passed the number of delegates needed for nomination the previous week, after winning Midwestern primaries. Former Secretary of State Edmund S. Muskie died March 26 in Georgetown University Hospital after suffering a heart attack. He was 81. A former governor and longtime senator from Maine, Mr. Muskie in 1972 was an early favorite to win the Democratic presidential nomination but lost to George McGovern.

Environmental enigma

About 200 government researchers March 26 unleashed a man-made flood into about 290 miles of the Grand Canyon's Colorado River in an attempt to replenish sand, silt, nutrients, and other elements to boost plant and animal life, some of which is on the endangered list. The move came despite protests from river guides that the flood would ruin trout fishing, and from nine Indian tribes that the flood could damage sacred sites. Meanwhile, in Casper, Wyom., a federal judge denied local ranchers' pleas to stop the federal government from releasing 17 more gray wolves into Yellowstone National Park; the wolves prey on local cattle.

Newt knocked

The House ethics committee concluded March 29 that Speaker Newt Gingrich ran afoul of standards of conduct but recommended no penalty for letting outside advisers use his office. Mr. Gingrich let Wisconsin businessman Donald Jones use his congressional office for the purpose of advising the speaker on the telecommunications deregulation bill. The ethics committee concluded, "Mr. Jones's participation in your office as an 'informal adviser' did not comply with applicable guidelines issued by this committee governing interns or volunteers." The complaint was filed by Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) and his informal adviser Ralph Nader, operating under the aegis of the Congressional Accountability Project.

Smuggling smorgasbord

In San Diego on March 28, police charged three people with trying to smuggle more than 15 Mexican illegal immigrants into the country by stuffing them into a four-by-four feet portable toilet strapped to the back of a pick-up truck, a first-of-a-kind attempt. A day later, Mexican authorities arrested five people for trying to smuggle newborn babies into the United States. In another border-related incident, in Miami on March 28, a federal grand jury charged 72 people with running a ring that stole more than $132 million in goods being imported by air and sea into Miami. And on March 29, Illinois authorities announced they had accidentally caught a major fugitive from justice: Melvin Taylor, 50, arrested for pickpocketing, turned out to be Richard Thomas, a member of the Black Panther group that grabbed hand grenades and raided a Philadelphia police station on Aug. 29, 1970. While Mr. Thomas has eluded capture by living out of and around the country, five others of his gang are already serving life sentences for the Philadelphia incident.

True confession

A member of the Aum Shinri Kyo cult confessed in Japanese court to releasing a lethal nerve gas that killed 12 and sickened over 5,000 one year ago. "What a stupid crime," Tokyo physician Ikuo Hayashi sobbed as he told a court he was among cult members who pierced two plastic bags containing the gas during morning rush hour in a Tokyo subway station.

Foster investigator

Whitewater prosecutors looking into former White House aide Vincent Foster's death have brought in an assistant U.S. attorney to assist them in the investigation. Steve Parker, a federal prosecutor in Tennessee for the past decade, will join the Whitewater team in Washington. Mr. Foster's suspicious death became part of the Whitewater probe because papers relating to the Clintons' Arkansas real estate venture were in Mr. Foster's White House office at the time he was found dead in a suburban Virginia park.

Court docket

On March 27, a federal judge denied former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega's bid for a retrial. Mr. Noriega, who is serving a 40-year sentence on drug and racketeering charges, claimed he should get a new trial on grounds that a key witness against him accepted more than $1.25 million from the federal government to testify. Meanwhile, in New York City, Judge Lorin Duckman got a leave of absence to prepare his defense on charges by state and national Republican leaders that he wrongly lowered the bail of a convicted rapist, and knowingly ignored the criminal's death threats to his girlfriend; the criminal then murdered her. And in New Castle, Pa., a jury found Rodney King not guilty of a drunk driving charge, his third since the now-famous drunk-driving incident when Los Angeles police beat him.

Budget roundup

After passing two week-to-week federal government funding bills in the month of March, Congress and President Clinton agreed on a two-week measure March 29 that averted a government shutdown and allowed lawmakers to adjourn for Easter. The funding extension legislation, which will keep federal agencies running through April 24, is the 12th stopgap measure enacted during Fiscal Year 1996. Other matters agreed to just prior to the congressional recess: a hike in the federal debt ceiling, a small Social Security reform that allows seniors to earn more money without losing government benefits, new authority for small businesses to challenge federal regulations in court, provision of $200 million to help rebuild Bosnia, and legislation to cap damages awards in product-liability lawsuits. President Clinton, a major recipient of trial lawyers' campaign contributions, says he will veto the legal reform bill. Approved March 28, the borrowing legislation Mr. Clinton signed raises the federal debt ceiling to $5.5 trillion-up from $4.9 trillion and enough to let the government continue borrowing well into 1997.

Justice delayed

An appellate court has refused to postpone the trial of a sexual harassment lawsuit against President Clinton until he is out of office, but lawyers for Paula Jones believe procedural delays will prevent the case from going to trial this year. The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis ruled March 28 that the case could proceed; a three-judge panel of that court made the same decision Jan. 9. Mr. Clinton's lawyer, Robert Bennett, says he'll ask the Supreme Court to delay the trial, but the long process of asking may achieve the same result. If the high court agrees to consider the case, there's virtually no chance a trial would start before the November election.