The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MR. LEHRER: Good evening. Leading the news this Friday, the confrontation between the students and the government worsened in China, a federal report criticized all in involved in the Alaska spill clean-up effort, and eight Palestinians and one Israeli soldier died in new clashes in the occupied territories. We'll have the details in our News Summary in a moment. Robin.

MR. MacNeil: After the News Summary, we look first at the climax of the mass demonstrations in China. We have a report from Beijing and the views of Chinese student Pei Minxin, Kenneth Lieberthal of the University of Michigan, and former State Department official Gaston Sigur. Next, our Congressional Correspondent Roger Mudd reports on an issue raised by the Jim Wright case, the employment of Congressional spouses, then David Gergen and Mark Shields with political analysis of the week's events, and we close with a Hodding Carter report on an old standby that's been revamped. NEWS SUMMARY

MR. MacNeil: The Chinese Government thousands of troops into Beijing, and ordered students to end their massive democracy demonstrations, saying they had created anarchy. The moves, amounting to martial law, were jeered by students, some of whom vowed not to leave. We have a report from Beijing by Jeremy Thompson of Independent Television News.

JEREMY THOMPSON: Premier Lee Pong appeared on state television late tonight with a grim message to the nation: Beijing was in a state of disorder, the country on the verge of chaos, and the army would be sent in to deal with it. Speaking to the Communist Party hierarchy in the Great Hall of the people, Premier Lee appealed to the army to do their job. He hoped the people would support them. His words seemed to reflect the hard line of Deng Xiaoping, though the senior leader was not present, also noticeably absent from the top table party chief Zhao Ziyang, who'd reportedly offered his resignation after failing to stop this crackdown. Pres. Yung Chankun then announced the army was now surrounding Beijing not to harm the students, he said, but to protect the city. The tension had been tightening since sunset. The voice of authority echoed over the darkened streets, "Go home and you won't be punished," a chill warning to thecrowd still pouring into the square. On Tiananmen, itself, another drama was unfolding. Student leaders held a crisis meeting at their command center. Then came the crackly announcement. The hunger strike was over, provisionally called of to protect the students' lives. It was heralded as a great victory, not a backdown. Thousands of students were then instructed to stage a sitdown protest. They have no intention of leaving, despite the government's warnings that measures would be taken to stop the chaos.

MR. THOMPSON: You're not scared of the soldiers?

STUDENT: I'm not scared. I will stay here. I'm not scared. I knew about the soldiers even before my coming here. It doesn't matter. Somebody's got to make some sacrifice.

MR. THOMPSON: Student reinforcements rushed to the square as the pro democracy campaigners prepared for confrontation. Their orders, when beaten, stay calm.

MR. MacNeil: As dawn broke over Beijing on Saturday morning, students were still massed in Tiananmen Square while the troops brought into the city were surrounded and blocked by more students and others. There were also reports that the hunger strike would resume in response to the government's action. In Washington, the State Department said the U.S. regrets the government's order to send them in. We'll have more on the China story after this News Summary. Jim.

MR. LEHRER: The Soviets began their military withdrawal from Hungary today. Six hundred troops and fifty-seven tanks pulled out, the first of five thousand tanks and fifty thousand soldiers that will be gone from Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and East Germany by 1991. There has been a strong Soviet military presence in Hungary since Soviet troops came to quell the 1956 uprising.

MR. MacNeil: President Bush called his top national security advisers to his sea side home in Kennebunkport, Maine today. With Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral William Crowe, and National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, the President was preparing for tomorrow's visit by French President Francois Mitterrand and the forthcoming NATO summit. The main issue was how to heal the split in the alliance over the future of short range nuclear weapons.

MR. LEHRER: President Bush has a new report which criticizes the response to the Alaska oil spill. The Associated Press confirmed a Washington Post story that a 37 page report was prepared by Transportation Secretary Samuel Skinner and Environmental Protection Agency Head William Reilly. It says the government and industry response to the crisis was wholly insufficient. The AP said it was delivered to President Bush yesterday. The report said the oil companies and government at all levels and government were unprepared and ill equipped to cope with the tragedy.

MR. MacNeil: In Israel's occupied West Bank, three Palestinians and one Israeli soldier were killed in the first gun battle between troops and Arabs in the Palestinian uprising. Seven soldiers, including a battalion commander, were wounded. An army patrol was called to a village near Hebron by a report of gunfire. Palestinians reportedly opened fire and threw a grenade, and the troops returned the fire. Arab reports said five more Palestinians were killed when soldiers fired on stone throwers in the Gaza Strip. In Washington, Israeli Foreign Minister Moshe Aarons called on Vice President Dan Quayle today. Aarons said Israel has asked the United States to lead an international campaign to raise two billion dollars to improve life in Palestinian refugee camps. He also discussed with Quayle Israel's plan to hold elections among the Palestinians.

MR. LEHRER: Former Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos is seriously ill. His wife told reporters in Honolulu he was near death at a Honolulu hospital from kidney, cardiac and other health problems. Philippine President Corazon Aquino denied a request that Marcos be allowed to return to the Philippines to die. She also said he could not be buried there.

MR. MacNeil: The independence plan for the Southwest Nation of Namibia is back on track. South Africa rules Namibia, but agreed to give up control and allow it to become independent in exchange for the withdrawal of Cuban troops from neighboring Angola. That agreement was stalled last month after battles between South African troops and Namibian nationalist guerrillas. But today, South Africa, Angola, and Cuba, agreed to continue the process which will give Namibia independence at the end of the year. That's our News Summary. Ahead we have the events in China, Congressional spouses, Gergen & Shields, and news for kids. FOCUS - SHOWDOWN

MR. MacNeil: We begin tonight with the showdown in China, now being seen live around the world as it unfolds in Central Beijing. In Tiananmen Square, hundreds of thousands of students and protesters continued their protest vigil, while at the Great Hall of the People, the government declared its intention to restore order. It prepared to back up its intention with army troops, who were standing by less than a mile away. Joining us now to discuss the events in Beijing, we have, as earlier in the week, Kenneth Lieberthal of the University of Michigan, he returned this week from Beijing, and is with us from Detroit. In Boston, we have graduate student Pei Minxin. He's at public station WGBH. Tonight we're also joined by Gaston Sigur, until last month Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian Affairs. Mr. Sigur accompanied President Bush on his trip to Beijing. Mr. Sigur, what do you make of the latest turn of events in Beijing?

GASTON SIGUR, Former State Department Official: Well, I'm very sorry that the government has decided to call out troops to deal with this situation. I was hoping that that would not happen. I do hope, of course, and expect that there will not be any major violence. I think that what are witnessing here in Beijing, and throughout China, as a matter of fact, is a kind of logical progression of the opening that has been at the heart of Chinese policy now for several years. We have seen the leadership of China declare that China is opening to the West in order to assist in a way with what China is doing to move forward in the modernization process that Deng Xiaoping has declared to be at the heart of Chinese policy, and tens of thousands of students have been sent to the United States, to Japan, to Europe, to Australia to study, and China is basically opening up its entire economic system. So I think it follows that people will be seeking ways in which to have political development, also, to proceed with economic openness. This it seems to me is quite logical and that's what we're witnessing.

MR. MacNeil: Pei Minxin in Boston, some of these students are your friends and colleagues. Are you confident this evening that they will be able to stand firm and stare down the government with troops surrounding them? How do you look at it?

PEI MINXIN, Student: [Boston] I think I'm quite confident that the students in Beijing, and particularly with the support of millions of people in Beijing, will be able to stand, make their stand on Tiananmen Square, and I don't think the soldiers will obey the orders to crack down or to use force against those, the students. I want to point out that what we're witnessing in China now is a profound crisis, the degree of which few people have foreseen. This crisis has the balance of whether the government will survive or what is left of the government will survive and whether this pro democratic revolution will succeed.

MR. MacNeil: Let's first just go to Mr. Lieberthal and then come back. What do you think of how this is going to unfold now? Is it going to be the government enforcing its will by force? Can it do that? Will the troops obey? What do you think?

KENNETH LIEBERTHAL, University of Michigan: [Detroit] I think the government is facing a very difficult situation. They had a choice as of a day or two ago of either moving dramatically toward concessions in order to gain credibility and stabilize the situation, or to try to use force to intimidate the students and try to stabilize the situation that way. They clearly have opted at least in the short run to attempt to intimidate students through bringing force to bear. I frankly don't see how troops can fully gain control over Beijing, without there being an enormous amount of bloodshed, and that would overall be a force for instability rather than stability. So I think the government has put itself now in a very difficult situation. It has committed its prestige to bringing order through marshalling uniform military forces, and at the same time those forces face virtually an entire city in opposition to them.

MR. MacNeil: What is the significance, Mr. Lieberthal, of the reported resignation of the Party General Secretary Zhao Ziyang?

MR. LIEBERTHAL: Well, Zhao has offered his resignation to indicate clearly that he dissents from the approach of using military force to create stability in Beijing. It is not clear whether that resignation has been accepted. If it has not been accepted, Zhao will emerge from this essentially as the hero of the government in the eyes of the students, the one man who is untainted by participation in a decision to bring force to bear and to create martyrs. If the resignation is accepted, then it seems to me we're left with a Politburo that is tilted heavily towards conservatives and we'll probably face a period of some retrenchment from reform and some repression, but I think fundamentally the basic message of this entire episode is the students have won, the political system will have to reflect the enormous desire for change that we've seen manifested over this past week or two.

MR. MacNeil: Do you read it that way, Mr. Sigur, that the students have won?

GASTON SIGUR, Former State Department Official: Well, I certainly think the students have captured the hearts of many people in China and certainly many people abroad. And the leadership must understand this. As I pointed out earlier, I do believe that this is a logical progression of what's been happening in China. The leadership should not be that surprised by what they're witnessing here and I hope that what we're seeing is that the student demands for opening up the system, for greater political tolerance, for people being able to have something to say about their own present circumstances and their future, I hope that the leadership will understand that these are not extreme demands at all, that these are demands which follow from the decisions that they have earlier taken to open China, and that they will, therefore, be willing to reach at least tacit agreement with the students that things have to change.

MR. MacNeil: But isn't there a big matter of face right now today in Beijing, that the government having now said you've got to leave, we have to restore order, there's going to be a riotous situation all over the country if we don't, that they will enormously lose face, and as we just heard from Pei Minxin, perhaps fall if the students don't obey? I mean, isn't it extremely crucial for the fate of this government that the students obey?

MR. SIGUR: Well, I think it's a question of what obedience really means here. I think that there is an opportunity for both sides to reach some kind of a tacit understanding of how they're going to get out of this very very difficult and dangerous situation. I don't think either side wants to see force used. Neither side wants to see blood flow, and I think that's a critical point here and that that gives us some hope that there can be, as I say, some kind of a tacit understanding of how to get out of this thing.

MR. MacNeil: You would agree with that, I guess, do you, Pei Minxin?

PEI MINXIN, Student: I don't agree with that. I think the government is willing to use force, particularly with the absence of moderate Zhao Ziyang in the party bureau. In fact, if the government is not willing to use force, why should you transfer almost six divisions of troops into Beijing? I think what's the use of so many soldiers.

MR. MacNeil: Perhaps, as has been suggested by Mr. Lieberthal, perhaps just as an intimidating measure.

PEI MINXIN: The government has resorted to intimidation before, they totally failed, and I think before Deng Xiaoping left for the South, as we were told, he must have given quite specific orders as to what to do with these troops.

MR. MacNeil: I gather you've talked to at least some people in China today.

PEI MINXIN: Yes.

MR. MacNeil: What do you report on the mood of the student leaders is?

PEI MINXIN: I think the students are still as determined as ever and above all, the people have been further angered by this intransigent response from the government. We also heard, by the way, that Mr. Zhao Ziyang's resignation has been accepted and we were told from several sources from China that he has been placed under house arrest, so the situation is really very critical.

MR. MacNeil: So you now expect actual confrontation, do you? I mean, you expect physical confrontation?

PEI MINXIN: No. I think the situation will be quite delicate. I expect millions of people will pour into the street -- it is daylight there -- and then the troops will not move, and then I think it is for the government to I think collapse. That will be the most likely scenario because according to one soldier, one officer, 80 percent of the soldiers are not willing to get involved in this.

MR. MacNeil: Do you see it going as far as the collapse of the government, Mr. Lieberthal?

MR. LIEBERTHAL: I frankly don't that is likely and I think it's hard to know how many of those troops will obey government orders to use force against the students. I would imagine that the government has pulled in divisions from well outside of Beijing that they have great confidence in and the reports of an unwillingness to crack down on students all come from Beijing-based troops. The government has avoided those in bringing force to bear. I also think that the time to reach the tacit agreement that Gaston Sigur was mentioning was a day or two ago, and the government has now publicly committed itself to using force in order to bring about a resolution to this issue, and any kind of use of force is likely to create martyrs, and so I think the situation is very volatile and runs a high risk of getting out of hand.

MR. MacNeil: Mr. Sigur.

MR. SIGUR: Well, I agree it's very volatile and it's very dangerous. I don't think there's any question about that. But I still believe that the government recognizes or must recognize the terrible danger that it faces if it really begins to shoot and if it begins to allow blood to flow. I don't know how you come back from that once you have moved in that direction. And it's hard for me to believe that the government leadership does not have some understanding of this.

MR. MacNeil: Do you agree with Pei Minxin that one of the logical outcomes of this is the destruction of this government, in other words, this government would have to be replaced?

MR. SIGUR: Well, the question is replaced with what. The question comes of who is there to take over.

MR. MacNeil: Who is there, Mr. Pei Minxin, in your view?

PEI MINXIN: Mr. Zhao Ziyang. I think he has done the right thing so far and he is now the national hero. A few days ago we would say after the coup. Now we would say after the -- he would be the most logical and perhaps most qualified leader now to take over.

MR. MacNeil: Somebody pointed out in a report from, I think it was on CNN earlier today, that the government had reacted to too soft a view of the earlier demonstrations a few years ago by putting Hu Yaobang in disgrace, and that that would happen now with Zhao.

PEI MINXIN: No. I think the situation in China now is totally different from two years ago, so the government again has made a horrible misjudgment and it should pay for it.

MR. MacNeil: What do you think the posture of the Bush administration should be? The State Department has said it regretted the sending in of troops, Mr. Sigur. What do you think it should be?

MR. SIGUR: Well, I think that's perfectly right to say that they regret it certainly. It's very very unfortunate, indeed, that the government has taken this step and I think that they were right in saying so. I think that we continue, it seems to me that our government continues to express its firm and constant belief in people's rights to have their say and that people have a right to participate, take part in their government, and to take part in the decisions that are made about them, about themselves and about their future and I think this is where we stand. We stand on this and this is the American posture.

MR. MacNeil: Well, gentlemen, all three of you, thank you for joining us. And we'll know on Monday night how this has turned out. Jim.

MR. LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, a Roger Mudd report on Congressional spouses, Gergen & Shields, and Hodding Carter on the Weekly Reader. FOCUS - CAPITOL CONFLICTS

MR. LEHRER: House Speaker Jim Wright's ethics case moves to a new stage next week. Tuesday the ethics committee will hear the Speaker's lawyers argue the charges against him should be dropped. Regardless of what the committee decides, those charges have already had one political impact. The ethics spotlight is now focused on a select group, the people married to members of Congress. Congressional Correspondent Roger Mudd reports.

ROGER MUDD: Even in Washington they are not instantly recognizable, but these women are obviously at ease in public. They are well dressed and well shod. They move naturally and with purpose. some look vaguely familiar, but only now and then can a political celebrity watcher put a name to a face. And yet they make up what is probably Washington's second most powerful species. They are Congressional wives and each year, usually in May, they gather at Washington's Shoreham Hotel to pay their respects to the first wife among them, the wife of the President of the United States. It's called the First Lady's Luncheon. Given by the Congressional Club, it begins at 11:30, but the wives and their guests, 1300 of them this year, start arriving by 10:30. At this one event, there is a higher concentration of influence and access to power, save perhaps the President's State of the Union Speech to a joint session, but this year, the focus of attention appears to be as much on this lady, the wife of the Speaker of the House, as it is on the First Lady. It was just a month ago that the House Ethics Committee, headed by Democrat Julian Dixon of California, said there was reason to believe that Speaker Wright had violated House rules because his wife had been given a yearly salary by a Texas friend and business associate for work for services for which there was no evidence. The accusation against Betty Wright brought a tremble to the Speaker's voice and chin.

REP JIM WRIGHT, Speaker of the House: [April 13] Those who are married to people in public office, in the Congress, are entitled to lives of their own. Perhaps half of the wives of members of Congress, spouses of members of Congress, are engaged or employed in a professional or a business relationship on their own. This day and time they have that right and that right must be absolute and it must be protected. And whatever else betides, I want to say to you that my wife is a good, decent, caring, thoroughly honorable person, and I'll damn well fight to protect her honor and her integrity against challenge by any source, whatever the cost.

MR. MUDD: As Washington watches in nervous fascination, the Betty Wright story seems to be spreading a haze of doubt over Congress's working spouses. Wives who work for their husbands on Capitol Hill for no pay refuse to be photographed or interviewed. Others, whose paying jobs are well within the ethics rules, stay silent for fear of being linked with Betty Wright. It's an old story on Capitol Hill. Almost every time a spouse comes into public view, it's to the embarrassment of the member. In 1976, bad publicity in New York caused Marian Javitz, the wife of the pro Israeli Senator Jacob Javitz, to quit her public relations job promoting Iran's national airline. In 1981, Rita Jenrette divorced her Congressman husband and then not only went public but went public with almost everything she had, posing for Playboy for an article titled "The Liberation of a Congressional Wife". In 1983, Elizabeth Taylor divorced Sen. John Warner of Virginia, saying she wouldn't wish her lonely life as a political wife on anybody. In 1984, it was Congressional husband John Zacaro whose finances threw Geraldine Ferraro's Vice Presidential campaign into a slump. And it was Sen. Mark Hatfield of Oregon who acknowledged there was the appearance of impropriety between his promoting a Greek financier's pipeline and his wife's acceptance of a $55,000 real estate finder's fee and commission from the same Greek financier. These are the cases that attract the media's attention even though or perhaps because they are out of the ordinary. And these are the cases that tend to make the American public skeptical or cynical about any and all Congressional wives. Most Americans wonder, for instance, why they have to work at all. Their husbands, they figure, are already making $89,500 a year. But a recent poll by USA Today reveals that 45 percent of Congressional spouses now work for pay, most of them because they say they have to make ends meet. For most wives, the range of jobs is open-ended. Their interests are eclectic, their qualifications substantial. Martha Hays Cooper has a master's degree in zoology and has been a professional ornithologist at the Smithsonian Institution. Her husband, Jim Cooper, is a Democratic Congressman from Tennessee. Mrs. Cooper now works as a special assistant in the Smithsonian's conservation section. At the Watergate Hotel, Alta Ruth Leath is the founder and owner of a jewelry shop, the Alta Mar Collection. Mrs. Leath, whose husband is a Texas Democrat, is buying tourelines from a gem salesman. On Capitol Hill, itself, Paula Swift, whose husband is a Washington State Democrat, is the volunteer head of the board of directors of the House Day Care Center, which takes care of about 60 children of staff and members. A few women like Betty Lee Dixon work out of their own homes. Mrs. Dixon, whose husband, Julian, is the chairman of the House Ethics Committee, is a distributor of what she calls advertising novelties and gifts for executives. French Wallop has been in business for more than 20 years. Her husband, Malcolm, is Wyoming's senior senator. Mrs. Wallop now owns two businesses, Corporate Travel Services and Corporate Consulting Inc. And in Georgetown, looking over a new $2.5 million residential listing with her real estate company, is in Ann Simpson, the wife of Wyoming's junior senator, Alan Simpson.

ANN SIMPSON: I think the reason most wives work is because they need to. When we came here with a campaign debt and keeping another home in Wyoming, and suddenly having two children in college and another one about to enter college, it was only logical that I would start to work.

MR. MUDD: Do you think there are certain jobs, Mrs. Simpson, that a Congressional spouse ought to avoid taking?

ANN SIMPSON: Well, I think any job that you're in in Washington perhaps has the potential for abuse.

MR. MUDD: How so?

ANN SIMPSON: People trying to have access. I have turned down many opportunities that I felt that I was being exploited.

MR. MUDD: You mean, people trying to reach your husband through you?

ANN SIMPSON: That's right. And I have had people that even voiced that, that -- and I have said, my husband is not available and if you'd like to have me as a realtor, I'd be happy to, but that doesn't guarantee you anything as far as access, and some people have not used me as a realtor.

MR. MUDD: Ann Simpson remembers the adjustment from Wyoming to Washington.

ANN SIMPSON: In a small town, you are the person who goes in first in line because you're a woman. Here, if you are the elected official and you are a woman, you go first, but if you're not, your husband goes first. I still remember being a brand new Senate wife and cashing a check in Safeway in Maclaine, and when they asked for my identification, I proudly said, well, my husband's a United States Senator, and they looked at me as though what's a United States Senator.

MR. MUDD: Judy Kearn Fazio remembers how long it took to find a job after she came to Washington as the bride of Congressman Vic Fazio of Sacramento.

JUDY FAZIO: It was just very very difficult to get over the Congressional spouse title, which absolutely surprised me. I don't think either Vic or I were prepared for the difficulty I would find, I would have in finding a job.

MR. MUDD: Mrs. Fazio, who is now Director of Development for the Center for National Policy, said potential employers wanted to know what would happen if her husband was defeated, would she put in a full work week, would she always be flying back to California.

JUDY FAZIO: I had never been asked questions like that before. You know, I had been treated and had worked in a very professional setting prior to my marriage. I came back here, went on job interviews, and all of a sudden felt like a possession, you know, as if I walked with a big sign, you know, spouse of Vic Fazio, [D] California. It was a very strange experience. I also became extremely depressed. I mean, it was probably one of the worst times of my life, in terms of self-esteem; it was non-existent.

MR. MUDD: Do you think there's a double standard at work in Washington?

JUDY FAZIO: Sure, I do. The spate of stories that has been written in the past few weeks have talked all about the female spouses and our particular situation. I haven't seen one male spouse even mentioned, and there are a good number of them. Now understandably, there are many many more of us who are female, but still I think in the way that we are treated particularly by the media in a situation like this there is a double standard.

MR. MUDD: Many wives are regular presences in the offices of their husbands. Annette and Tom Lantos have been inseparable not only since his election to Congress from California, but also since their childhood together in Budapest. Mrs. Lantos works without pay as Executive Director of the House Human Rights Caucus and as her husband's executive assistant.

MR. MUDD: As an executive assistant to your husband, do you keep regular office hours?

ANNETTE LANTOS: Regular office hours.

MR. MUDD: You do?

ANNETTE LANTOS: 9 to 6 every morning.

MR. MUDD: And you have an office here in his Congressional office?

ANNETTE LANTOS: Yes, if you can call it that. It's just a place where the Xerox machines used to be. And I have a desk now there.

MR. MUDD: And because you and your husband were married before he was elected to Congress, the law prohibits you from becoming an employee?

ANNETTE LANTOS: Yes, absolutely.

MR. MUDD: Do you think the law is a good law? Do you think the law is better on the books than off the books?

ANNETTE LANTOS: Well, in my case, I think it is somewhat unfair because I put in long hours and work very hard and as you know, our pay is very small. And I feel that I am doing professional level work. I am a trained professional from my background, and I think that under normal conditions, I would expect to get some amount of compensation for the number of hours that I put in, but on the other hand, I'm also very aware that this could be abused by, in other circumstances.

MR. MUDD: Mary Regula has been married since 1950, but she's been a wife of since 1972 when her husband, Ralph, was elected to Congress from Ohio. She too keeps a small desk near her husbands, helping oversee constituent tours of the capital. Mary Regula is also the current present of the Congressional Club and is the closest thing the spouses have to a spokesman.

MR. MUDD: Mrs. Regula, do you think there are certain jobs that Congressional wives should not take?

MARY REGULA: Absolutely not.

MR. MUDD: Any job is okay?

MARY REGULA: I think any job is okay, and I'll tell you, I think the secret is disclosure, which is true now. Every member is required to fill out a financial disclosure form. The third question down there, is does your spouse work and for whom does she work. If she earns, I think, over $1,000, you have to disclose. And I have no problem with that, and I don't think any spouse does. What exposure does is it brings the light into what could be a very dark corner of politics. And I think the media's responsibility is to continue to shine that light.

MR. MUDD: What's been the effect on the Betty Wright story on the standing of Congressional wives?

MARY REGULA: I think it will make people back home -- eventually this is going to come back and it's going to make people more aware of their member and what their member spouse is doing. But coming from a district in Ohio, I think they already know that's the reason my husband gets re-elected.

ANN SIMPSON: I think with the Wright story that everyone is being very cautious and making sure that they re-examine all situations to make sure that they won't be misinterpreted, which I don't see that as a particularly unhealthy thing. I think a little caution is good in all our cases.

JUDY FAZIO: I think there's a real sense of concern that we may go that next step and somebody may say spouses shouldn't work or if spouses do work, they shouldn't work for this or this or that. Restrictions like that I think would make what can be a very difficult situation for a spouse looking for employment in this town a completely untenable one.

ANNETTE LANTOS: Then one or two of us get into trouble, you know, we all are beginning to be viewed with suspicion and we all feel not quite right about ourselves and we really hope that in the end the Speaker and his wife will be cleared from any wrongdoing.

MR. MUDD: In the sometimes murky world of Congressional ethics, wives and families are at the greatest disadvantage. Even the strictest adherence to the rules does not always guarantee anonymity. The best rule of all is, said one of the wives, if you can't stand to see it on the front page, don't do it. FOCUS - GERGEN & SHIELDS

MR. LEHRER: It is Friday, and that means Gergen & Shields, which means our regular analysis team of David Gergen, Editor at Large of U.S. News & World Report, Mark Shields, Syndicated Columnist for the Washington Post. First, the problems of Speaker Wright, there's a hearing Tuesday on his motions to dismiss the charges, Mark. It will be televised. How does he stand going into that event?

MARK SHIELDS, Washington Post: Jim, the jury hasn't even been impaneled and the judgment is in. The Speakership of Jim Wright is history.

DAVID GERGEN, U.S. News & World Report: I think that's basically right. We're going to see -- I think that the man does deserve to present his case. Politically I think he's finished, but I think unless he can produce a miracle in this hearing to dismiss these charges, there's going to be enormous pressure on him as soon as this initial set of hearings is over. And this, after all, is a procedural set of hearings to determine whether these charges will --

MR. LEHRER: This is a preliminary hearing on Tuesday, right?

MR. GERGEN: This is preliminary. If he gets through this and he wants to stay on, he would then go into what would be considered a formal trial, in which he would present evidence and others would present evidence.

MR. LEHRER: Let me ask you this, guys. The papers, meaning the Washington Post and the New York Times have been filled with stories this week. Actually they began last week. High level Democrats are saying just what you two guys have been saying. It's all over, it's all over but the shouting. But that's what these Democrats are saying. But there's never a name attached to this. Everything publicly is just the opposite. What's going on? What are these guys trying to do?

MARK SHIELDS, Washington Post: I'll tell you exactly what's going on. One prominent Democrat who didn't want his name on it put it this way, said he compared the present political climate in Washington to the time when Francisco Franco, the Spanish dictator, lay dying and at that point a longtime critic and foe, adversary of Franco, was awakened and told there's good news and there's bad news; the good news is Franco's dead, the bad news is you have to tell him. And that's the problem, nobody really wants to tell Jim Wright.

MR. LEHRER: Well, they've been telling him on the front page --

MR. SHIELDS: Well, they are, but you see the guy in private. How am I doing? You're doing terrific, boss, you're great, I mean, nobody in the business -- politicians don't like to say no. I mean, that isn't how, politics is a matter of addition, not subtraction. I don't go up and say that's a lousy amendment you've got. I say, I'd like to be with you, Jim. And that's -- and no one's saying that to Jim Wright. They don't want to say that to him.

DAVID GERGEN, U.S. News & World Report: And his close in friend don't believe it. There are, after all, John Dingell and others and Jack Brooks and so forth, who do not agree with this, who do not agree that he's had it. They think he's being unfairly treated; they think he's being railroaded. But other Democrats are trying to send a signal. They're going to the press, they're leaking these stories out, they're passing remarks to people like us, saying this is over, it's just a matter of a few days, and so I think that's the reason that basically it's concluded. You can't dig out of it.

MR. LEHRER: If he's being railroaded, who's running the train, who is behind all of this?

MR. GERGEN: The honest answer I think is that the hole is deeper than it was a few weeks ago when the Ethics Committee passed judgment.

MR. LEHRER: But nothing's happened.

MR. GERGEN: Something has happened. There have been a stream of stories since then mostly by the Wall Street Journal, bringing to light new questions, new allegations, new episodes involving an S&L, involving oil and gas questions, involving a nursing home, and very importantly this week a story broke which has been confirmed now that the IRS has launched a criminal investigation of his dealings with Malick, the man in question in the Ethics Committee. Now that's added a lot of weight to the sled. It's a very hard sled for Wright to pull now.

MR. SHIELDS: I agree with David there, and I'd just add there will be scrupulous adherence to due process in this, and there's basically three reasons why there will be. One, there are those who sincerely believe that Jim Wright ought to be exonerated; they will fight for due process. There are those who sincerely believe in due process. But I'll tell you what, in the current climate, there are those who are sincerely scared stiff they could be next. And that's the fear. There's a fear factor in this whole political climate right now.

MR. LEHRER: A few little things.

MR. SHIELDS: I mean, there is a sense -- I mean, I was talking to David Obey, the Congressman from Wisconsin, and who --

MR. LEHRER: Big Wright defender.

MR. SHIELDS: Had been a Wright defender on the ethics, on the substance of the charges. He thought that the substance of the charges brought by the House Ethics Committee and the Phelan report were unfair and inaccurate, a misreading of what he had written in 1977. Up to 1977, Jim Wright came to the Congress 23 years before that, up to 1977, you could use your office accounts, I mean, your own official office account, at the end of the year if there was any money left in it, you put it in your own pocket, you could pay off your bills with campaign funds, there was no limit on outside income, no limit on honoraria. You know, it is kind of a changing climate, changing standards, what are they going to look at? You saw Roger's piece.

MR. GERGEN: And people are looking backwards.

MR. LEHRER: Roger's speech speaks to that.

MR. GERGEN: It certainly does.

MR. LEHRER: Exactly. That's exactly right.

MR. GERGEN: There's one is that some Congressman had been involved with some picayune things, which don't amount to anything, but in the current climate could make them look bad and they're worried about that. All these guys are worried about re-election obviously, and to the extent that somebody had to return some baseball cards he'd gotten as a gift from a constituent -- you know, a guy gave him a set of six or eight baseball cards, but they were valued over $100, he had to give it back. I mean, you wouldn't conceive of that in earlier times, doing something like that. But I think what these wives, Ann Simpson and others, you know, these are very honorable people and most of the people serving Congress, as you well know, are extremely honorable. I think what they deserve at the end of this is some set of guidelines that they can all live by so everybody knows. Obviously, Congressional spouses ought to be allowed to work, but they ought to do it in the safety and security of knowing when they take the job, somebody's not going to come back and kick them on it.

MR. LEHRER: From the day they take the job.

MR. GERGEN: From the day they take the job, there should be someplace they can turn and get guidance and rely on it.

MR. LEHRER: They don't have that now.

MR. GERGEN: They don't have that.

MR. SHIELDS: In fairness to Jim Wright, the criticism that the Republicans are leveling against him now is that the House isn't moving, the House, things aren't happening in the House. I mean, I didn't see the Bush 21 point program that's being demanded in action, but the fact of the matter is he's paying the price because he's been an effective leader. I mean, Jim Wright was a very effective Speaker.

MR. LEHRER: Till all this happened.

MR. SHIELDS: Till all this happened. And the second thing is that to Jim Wright's credit, you always knew where you stood. I mean, Jim Wright isn't the modern breed who's cozy and cute and going to do case work and handle constituent matters and you never can smoke him out on any issue. Jim Wright was always there on those issues and to some degree I think that's been overlooked in this whole rush to judgment.

MR. GERGEN: I think that's right. And in many ways, Wright is a better Speaker, more effective leader than Tip O'Neill was. But there's one critical difference, and that was, just as we saw in the John Tower affair, a loner pays a heavy price in a situation like that. Jim Wright does not have enough allies and personal friends.

MR. LEHRER: In an organization which supposedly operates on the other --

MR. GERGEN: Right. Had it been Tip O'Neill in this set of events early on, I'm not sure it would have gone this way at all.

MR. SHIELDS: Just one final thing. Tip dealt with Ronald Reagan at the top of his game.

MR. GERGEN: That's true.

MR. SHIELDS: I mean with all respect to Jim Wright. I mean, he, Tip O'Neill put together a Democratic alternative in 1982 that allowed him to come back and win 26 House seats against the most popular President since Roosevelt.

MR. LEHRER: Quick thing on President Bush, he and his administration have caught it all week for their response to Gorbachev and the stunning moves toward democracy in China. Do you think it's justified? Does he deserve to be rapped on this?

MR. GERGEN: The administration argues that, look, there's not much we can do that would be helpful and they're very reluctant to get in the middle and come down on the side of the students. Having said that, Gorbachev came out on the side of the students after it was all over. I see no reason why the President of the United States can't do it. I think he could do substantive things. Jesse Helms introduced a resolution, as you know, to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee which was passed yesterday, which asks the Secretary of State and the government, look, if you use the military to crack down, that's going to seriously damage our relations. It seems to me that's the least the President can do. I think there are also some symbolic things that he could do, Jim, and I think he could call in say some of these Chinese students from Harvard that you've had on your show. He could ask them to come see him in the White House. That would send a signal that he's here, that his heart is with them.

MR. LEHRER: Mark, also, on Gorbachev, Marlin Fitzwater, Mr. Bush's Press Secretary, called Gorbachev a "drugstore cowboy" after he promised to quit sending arms to Nicaragua.

MR. SHIELDS: That's right.

MR. LEHRER: What's that all about?

MR. SHIELDS: Well, I don't think that's been adequately explained, what it's all about. You know, what's a drugstore cowboy? We really don't know, but it's not the kind of terminology, language you'll want to use in dealing with a major adversary, a major figure in the world. It just strikes me that what Gorbachev is right now is George Bush's only political adversary. I mean, the Democrats are in a series, a state of somnolence, disorder, disarray, whatever else, and he, they're kind of pitted off, and Gorbachev's got Bush talking to himself. I mean, Gorbachev moves; Bush reacts, reacts slowly, he reacts boldly, Bush kind of reacts less boldly, and I think that's a problem for Bush and implicitly what George Bush is also being compared to is another figure, a ghost from his past, that's Ronald Reagan. And I think it's really starting to bother him.

MR. GERGEN: There's a frustration level, obviously, within the White House about the way they're being hit so hard in the press for not playing "the PR game" as they call it. I think they're starting to lash out a bit. I think they made a mistake by going after Gorbachev this week. That way they caught hell in the press, are catching hell in Europe, and they'd be far better off to come up with some proposals of their own.

MR. LEHRER: Gentlemen, we have to go.

MR. SHIELDS: We want to say happy birthday to you, Jim.

MR. GERGEN: Happy birthday, Jim.

MR. LEHRER: Thank you very much, both of you. FINALLY - NEWS FOR KIDS

MR. MacNeil: Finally tonight a story about a news source for young readers and a venerable institution in American journalism. It's the Weekly Reader, a newspaper written especially for elementary schoolchildren. The Weekly Reader as a circulation larger than Time and NewsWeek combined, and as Special Correspondent Hodding Carter shows us, its huge readership is also a loyal one, even when reading, itself, is a new experience.

HODDING CARTER: It's Weekly Reader time in Heddy Rudney's fifth grade classroom in Easthampton, Connecticut. Yes, it's the same Weekly Reader that generations of schoolchildren have been reading since 1928. Each week, the Weekly Reader giveskids current news, along with a moral lesson or two. This week's lesson, athletes and steroids. [CLASSROOM SESSION]

MR. CARTER: Today over 9 million American schoolchildren from pre-kindergarten to sixth grade read the Weekly Reader in their classrooms. For the last 60 years, this newspaper for children has guided millions of youngsters through the puzzling and often frightening current events of their time, the news of war, technology, assassination, racial unrest and political scandal. This is the first edition of the Weekly Reader which was published over 60 years ago and is now held here in the company's library vaults in Middletown, Connecticut. This first edition had stories about the boyhoods of the Quaker boy, Herbert Hoover, and the little news boy, Al Smith, who were then running for the Presidency of the United States. From that first edition to today with stories about space probes and AIDS, and hunger in the world, the Weekly Reader has held to its main mission, which is to educate, to inform, to engage young Americans about the world around them. As its founder, Eleanor Johnson put it, it is to be colorful, but uncolored. Eleanor Johnson was a school teacher from Pennsylvania, when she became the driving force behind the Weekly Reader.

TERRY BORTON, Weekly Reader: She was really extraordinary, very short, slight. She was four feet ten I think, an absolute dynamo, just full of energy.

MR. CARTER: Twenty-one years after Miss Johnson began the Weekly Reader in Columbus, Ohio, the paper was sold to Wesleyn University, which moved it to the school's Middletown, Connecticut, campus in 1949. In 1965, the Xerox Corporation bought the paper, changed it to a lighter news format, and during the 1970s, presided over a disastrous loss of nearly half its readership, from 13 million in 1970 to 6 million in 1977. Late that year, Editor in Chief Terry Borton came aboard to salvage the paper. Borton immediately turned to Eleanor Johnson, whom he convinced to come back to the paper as a consultant.

TERRY BORTON: The first time I met her I went down to her home in Frederick, Maryland, to see about consulting on Weekly Reader, and she sat me down at her dining room table, in this ramrod straight chair, with all of this stuff spread out across the whole table, and for the next six hours, we went right through this stuff she had laid out, and she gave me a kind of crash course in what I ought to be doing to make Weekly Reader successful.

MR. CARTER: Miss Johnson's crash course had one primary message; the Weekly Reader had gone soft. The skills page had been eliminated entirely. The original hard news format had been replaced by more fancy packaging in an attempt to be more palatable to children of the television age. Miss Johnson insisted that the paper get back to what she had created it to be, a newspaper for kids. The paper followed her advice and within four years regained half of its lost readership. In 1985, the paper was taken over by Field Publications. The Weekly Reader's offices are situated on the quiet outskirts of Middletown, Connecticut. Inside there is none of the hustle and bustle associated with a newsroom. Appearing more like a college library, the atmosphere reflects the more contemplative approach of the organization which takes seriously its job of translating news for children. From the artist at her easel to the latest in computerized graphics, the Weekly Reader mixes tradition with modernization. The process has brought about several changes.

TERRY BORTON, Weekly Reader: I would say the major change is our increasing sophistication in handling controversial stories and our increasing willingness to do so. That's not a change in philosophy. That was the philosophical position right from the beginning but there were a number of stories looking back we would consider significant that were avoided.

MR. CARTER: A story that would have been avoided until recently.

MR. BORTON: Drugs. When we first began to deal with drugs, we were very concerned about it. We did a survey, a national survey of kids. We had a half million kids responding and it was the first time that there was any significant data about the effect of the drug culture on kids, and partly as a result, as responding to our own information, we began to increase our coverage for young kids.

MR. CARTER: Today's Weekly Reader doesn't shy away from notorious, controversial or complex news stories that touch children's lives; racism, AIDS, the economy and drugs. Covering such stories for children can be difficult, so the paper has established an elaborate set of guidelines to assure balanced, unbiased and appropriate material. The aim, say Weekly Reader editors, is to expose children to the real world but with the patience and sensitivity necessary for young readers.

CONNIE UNSWORTH, Weekly Reader: I think children need to be led into having a wide view of where their world is going. When we look for a news story we try and find something that's first of all of interest to the children, worth knowing about, that the teacher can deal with and that the children have some connection with.

MR. CARTER: Teachers say they rely on the straightforward informative approach of the paper.

CAROLYN HORNE, Elementary School Teacher: I think they're bringing to the children with a child's point of view involved. Children can't do much about what is happening within the world around them, but they certainly are able to understand and to bring some reason to it, and I think this is something the Weekly Reader attempts to do.

MR. CARTER: Many of the editors and writers at the Weekly Reader are former teachers. They say their teaching experience is valuable in determining the content of Weekly Reader's eight separate editions, pre-kindergarten through sixth grade. Each edition demands a different approach. [WEEKLY READER STAFF MEETING]

MR. CARTER: This is a fourth grade editorial team planning an upcoming issue, featuring a story about the Soviet space program and mission to Mars. The Weekly Reader is a newspaper without news reporters in the usual sense. Story ideas come from newspapers, magazines and other periodicals. The Weekly Reader's writers then investigate and shape the story with a child's perspective in mind.

STUDENT: They sort of know how fifth graders think. They know they're not going to think like a 26 year old or a 30 year old.

STUDENT: I like reading the articles because I want to learn about the world. I want to know what's going on.

REPORTER: And the weekly reader does that?

STUDENT: Yeah. That's why I think it's so special. It's like a newspaper made for kids.

LYNELL JOHNSON, Weekly Reader: We have a very weighty sense of responsibility. We're aware of the fact that 9 million kids for half an hour or so every week, 27 weeks during the year, we have their attention. And we take that very seriously. We think that's a great privilege, but also a great responsibility.

MR. CARTER: It is a responsibility that is greeted with warm recognition.

BRUCE SIEDE, President, Field Publications: We had an argument one day in my office. Somebody came in and said peopledon't remember Weekly Reader anymore. So we picked up the phone and we started dialing operators across the country and asked them if they remembered Weekly Reader, and no matter who you talked to, the reaction is always, is that still around, I remember the days I used Weekly Reader.

MR. CARTER: Today, 60 years after those first stories about Herbert Hoover and Al Smith, the Weekly Reader still takes seriously its responsibility to introduce American children to the world around them. And just like Sue Culp's first graders in Easthampton, Connecticut, children will continue to look forward to that day each week when the Weekly Reader arrives. RECAP

MR. MacNeil: Again, the main stories this Friday, Chinese students faced a showdown as the government ordered them to end mass demonstrations and move thousands of troops into Beijing, a federal report blamed all concerned for the response to the Alaska oil spill, in Israel's occupied territories, eight Palestinians and one Israeli soldier were killed in clashes. One of them involved the first gun battle between troops and Arabs in the Palestinian uprising. Good night, Jim.

MR. LEHRER: Good night, Robin. Have a nice weekend and we'll see you on Monday night. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.