News Digest July 11-17

NATION

More Flood Destruction

It was another week of hauling sandbags, scrounging for bottled water and fleeing for higher ground in nine Midwestern states as the Mississippi River and its tributaries continued to flood. In Iowa, days of rain sent the Des Moines and Raccoon rivers flowing over their banks, inundating farmland and knocking out Des Moines's main water-purification plant, leaving 250,000 people without running water. President Bill Clinton ended a Hawaiian vacation early to tour affected areas. "I've never seen anything on this scale before," he said. Clinton promised to ask Congress to approve $2.5 billion or more in disaster relief.

Don't Ask, Don't Tell

On the July 15 deadline that President Clinton established for the Pentagon to draw up a policy on gays in the military, Defense Secretary Les Aspin gave his support to a proposal that the Joint Chiefs of Staff have approved but gay- rights groups bitterly oppose because it would still allow discharges for homosexual conduct on or off base. Though the proposed plan would discourage military investigations to identify homosexuals, it would generally allow soldiers and sailors to identify themselves as gay only to chaplains, lawyers and doctors. The military code would be revised, slightly, to make gay conduct rather than homosexual status incompatible with military service.

Going, Going . . .

Saying he did not intend to offer his resignation, FBI Director William Sessions nevertheless cut short a Chicago trip to meet with his boss, Attorney General Janet Reno. Neither would comment after the half-hour conference on Saturday; as Sessions left, he tripped over a curb and broke two bones in his elbow. A day earlier, President Clinton met with Sessions' possible successor: Judge Louis Freeh of New York.

Racist Would-Be Assassins

Los Angeles police and FBI agents arrested eight white supremacists who they say planned to assassinate Rodney King and other well-known black figures. According to police, the men also plotted to bomb one of the city's prominent black churches and spray its congregation with machine-gun fire. Several of those arrested belong to groups preaching racial war, including the Fourth Reich Skinheads and the White Aryan Resistance.

Indictment in Terror Plots

In New York City a federal grand jury indicted Ibrahim A. Elgabrowny for his alleged role in a plot to blow up tunnels and the United Nations. The indictment of Elgabrowny, already in prison in connection with the bombing of the World Trade Center, provides the first public evidence that the participants in both schemes were linked.

More Single Mothers

A Census Bureau report showed that between 1982 and 1992 the percentage of never married adult women who have children rose from 15% to 24%. The rate was highest among black women (56%), but it more than doubled among whites (6.7% to 14.6%) and college-educated women (3% to 6.4%).

Surgeon General on Hold

Under pressure from Republicans, the White House postponed confirmation hearings for Dr. Joycelyn Elders, Clinton's choice as Surgeon General, to allow time to examine questions about her finances. The main problem is a lawsuit against the National Bank of Arkansas in which the plaintiffs contend that former board members, including Elders, condoned shoddy and even illegal lending practices.

Everglades Revival Plan

Resolving a standoff between environmentalists and agribusiness, the Interior Department announced a tentative agreement with Florida and that state's vegetable farmers and sugar industry on a $465 million plan to restore the Everglades. Phosphorus pollution from fertilizer and the diversion of water by overdevelopment have contributed to the transformation of what was a 4 million-acre freshwater marsh into a murky 2 million-acre swamp.

WORLD

Japanese Earthquake

Japan's most devastating earthquake in 45 years, measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale, destroyed villages and set fires across a small island near Hokkaido, the northernmost of Japan's main islands. At least 166 people were killed -- most by the 10-ft.-to-30-ft. tidal waves, or tsunamis, that swept victims into the ocean and tossed boats onto the shore.

No Letup in Somalia

Is the U.N. keeping the peace or making war? Renewed attacks early last week by American helicopter gunships against warlord Mohammed Farrah Aidid killed 54 Somali civilians, according to International Red Cross estimates. Outraged mobs retaliated by killing four foreign journalists. Italian General Bruno Loi, commander of a 2,400-man contingent, sharply criticized the U.N.'s "shoot first" policies, causing a crisis between his government, which backed him, and the U.N.

North Korean Nukes

Frustrated by North Korea's renewed threat to drop out of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, President Clinton issued an attention-getting warning: If North Korea uses an atomic weapon, he said, "we would quickly and overwhelmingly retaliate . . . It would mean the end of their country as they know it." Pyongyang denied working on bombs, but responded in firm (though stilted) language of its own: "If anyone dares to provoke us, we will immediately show him in practice what our bold decision is."

Mission to Hanoi

After three days of talks in Hanoi, the U.S. suggested the deployment of three State Department officers to help investigate the fates of MIAs after the Vietnam War. The Vietnamese government, hoping to reverse an American economic embargo, agreed in principle. The U.S. delegation would be the country's first extended diplomatic presence in Hanoi since the war's end.

Brought to Justice

The man said to be responsible for one of the bloodiest airplane hijackings of the 1980s was shocked last week to find himself in a Washington court. Omar Mohammed Ali Rezaq had been in a Ghanaian prison when authorities put him on a plane for Lagos, setting an elaborate police operation in motion. In a deal with the U.S., Nigeria refused to let him enter the country. U.S. agents who had slipped aboard the Nigeria-bound jetliner then had him arrested. Rezaq is said to be the sole survivor among the Palestinian hijackers who seized Egypt Air Flight 648 in 1985. After a forced landing in Malta, two women passengers were shot in cold blood; Egyptian commandos stormed the plane, and an additional 58 were killed.

BUSINESS

Shopping Spree

In a deal likely to create a giant broadcast marketplace, QVC Network, headed by former film mogul Barry Diller, offered to take control of its only serious competitor, the Home Shopping Network, for an estimated $1.2 billion in stock.

P&G Cleans House

With many consumers abandoning brand-name products for lower-cost private labels, Procter & Gamble, the maker of Tide, Crest and Pampers, announced that over the next four years it would close 30 plants, eliminate 13,000 jobs, and cut some prices as much as 15%.

Inflation Goes Flat

For the first time in two years, consumer prices remained steady for an entire month, according to the Labor Department's Consumer Price Index for June. That news came the day after producer prices for the same month were reported to have declined 0.3%, the largest drop in two years. With the annual inflation rate at 2.2% for the past three months, worries that the Federal Reserve might raise interest rates have essentially vanished. The bad news is that the absence of price pressure seems to be the result of anemic economic growth.

Just $1,255,238.10 a Hole

At an auction conducted in Dallas by the RTC, the federal agency selling off assets of failed S&Ls, six golf resorts in three states, with a total of 315 holes, were sold for $395.4 million, well above what they were expected to bring.

SCIENCE

Gay Genes

The notion that sexual orientation is inborn, and not simply a life-style choice, was supported with the announcement that male homosexuality may be linked to a gene or genes on the human X chromosome. Female homosexuality is now under investigation as well.

Ancient Cloth

Archaeologists digging in southeastern Turkey have unearthed what appears to be the oldest piece of cloth ever found. The partly fossilized swatch measures 1 1/2 in. by 3 in., and was wrapped around the handle of a tool made from an antler. It's presumed to be linen, and it has been dated to about 7000 B.C., making it at least 500 years older than any other cloth previously discovered.

MEDIA & THE ARTS

ABC Cuts a Cable Deal

Breaking ranks with the other networks, ABC will allow Continental Cablevision, the nation's third largest cable operator, to carry ABC-owned broadcast stations without paying it a fee; in return, the cable company has agreed to carry and pay for a new cable channel, ESPN2, a spin-off of ESPN, which ABC's parent company owns.

It's a Small World After All

The Walt Disney Co. has agreed that in videos of its cartoon hit Aladdin it will change song lyrics describing the hero's native land as a place "where they cut off your ear/ If they don't like your face/ It's barbaric, but hey, it's home." Because Disney is not eliminating the "barbaric" line, the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, which brought the complaint, is still complaining.

Blue-Chip Blues Stake

With $10 million of its $6 billion endowment, Harvard University will become the largest investor in a $32 million plan for nationwide expansion by House of Blues, a music club in Harvard Square partly owned by actor Dan Aykroyd.