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Congress and President Clinton struck a budget deal. Scorecard: Clinton gets 1) $18 billion for the International Monetary Fund; 2) $1 billion for 100,000 elementary school teachers; 3) a big boost in aid to farmers; 4) elimination of nearly all the Republican Party's tax cuts; 5) reduction of GOP environmental riders; and 6) birth control insurance coverage for federal employees. The GOP gets 1) the biggest peacetime military-spending hike in 13 years; 2) more money for the drug war; and 3) postponement of the fight over census sampling. The spins: 1) The cowardly GOP caved to Clinton. 2) By caving to Clinton, the GOP deprived him of a government shutdown or legislative fights, thereby protecting the likelihood of Republican gains in the Nov. 3 elections. 3) What's the point of Republicans winning elections if they won't use their clout in budget negotiations? 4) Both parties got what they wanted. 5) By getting what they wanted, both parties raided the surplus and busted the 1997 balanced budget deal. (10/16/98)

The Federal Reserve cut interest rates another quarter of a percentage point. This move, intended to stimulate lending and economic growth, comes after 1) the Fed cut rates by a quarter-point just two weeks ago; 2) Japan produced a new plan to rescue its banks; and 3) the U.S. Congress finally coughed up $18 billion to shore up the IMF. Pessimists think the Fed's odd timing (cutting interest rates immediately, rather than waiting for its regular meeting) means that the economy is in worse shape than we thought. Optimists are happy the Fed is doing something, anything, to avert a global recession. The optimists prevailed on Wall Street, boosting stocks by more than 4 percent. (10/16/98)

The two chief brokers of the Northern Ireland peace agreement won the Nobel Peace Prize. The sunny spin: The Nobel Committee honored Catholic leader John Hume and Protestant leader David Trimble by giving them the prize. The dark spin: The committee froze out Sinn Fein (read: Irish Republican Army) boss Gerry Adams, who had been expected to share it. The Nobel Prize in literature went to Portuguese novelist José Saramago. (See Slate's "Assessment" of Saramago.) (10/16/98)

The San Diego Padres will meet the New York Yankees in the World Series. The Yankees steamrolled their playoff opponents after compiling a record-breaking 114 wins in the regular season, whereas the suddenly hot Padres upset two 100 win teams, the Houston Astros and the mighty Atlanta Braves, en route to the series. The sentimental spin: The Padres should win, because they're the plucky underdogs and because baseball owes it to Tony Gwynn, the hard-working veteran who has stayed with the usually mediocre Padres rather than bolting to an elite team such as the Yankees. The unsentimental spin: The Yankees will crush the Padres. (10/16/98)

The Paula Jones settlement talks have collapsed again. New York tycoon Abe Hirschfeld, who has nothing to do with the case, offered Jones' lawyers $1 million to settle it. Instead, Jones' lawyers quarreled over which of them should get it. Her original lawyers, who quit the case last year after she refused to settle it for $700,000, insist they are entitled to the first $800,000 of any settlement. Her new lawyers, who say they have spent more than $1.5 million in legal fees, say this would kill the deal. Jones' friends say if there's a settlement, she wants a big cut. The lawyers reportedly want Hirschfeld's $1 million in addition to, rather than in lieu of, $700,000 from Clinton. Hirschfeld says that if the lawyers don't work out their quarrel, he'll withdraw his offer. A hearing to reinstate the case is scheduled for next week. (10/16/98)

Twenty-year-old Jeremy Strohmeyer was sentenced to life in prison without parole for sexually assaulting and strangling a 7-year-old girl in a casino last year. The real story at the sentencing hearing was the excuses Strohmeyer offered: 1) He was in a "drunken and drugged haze" and doesn't remember the assault. 2) The government had failed to tell his adoptive parents about his mother's psychosis and drug abuse. 3) His former girlfriend had led him to abuse drugs. 4) His therapist was incompetent. 5) The casino let kids play at its arcade. 6) He murdered the girl to "stop her pain" after he assaulted her. Strohmeyer's case became infamous because his friend, David Cash, nonchalantly denied that he had done anything wrong by failing to stop the murder despite being present. At his sentencing, Strohmeyer one-upped Cash by blaming him for failing to intervene. (10/16/98)

Matthew Shepard, a gay man, died of wounds he suffered in a robbery and beating in Wyoming. President Clinton, Vice President Gore, and the national media decried the attack and portrayed it as an anti-gay hate crime. While blaming conservative critics of gay rights for fostering the atmosphere that led to Shepard's murder, many liberal pundits continued to oppose hate-crime laws, noting that 1) it's enough to punish the culprits for murdering a person, regardless of that person's sexual orientation, and 2) it's dangerous to get into the business of punishing criminals for what they think, as opposed to what they do. (For an analysis of the politics of Shepard's murder, see Slate's "Frame Game," "St. Matthew.") (10/16/98)

The United States and Yugoslavia announced a deal to avert NATO airstrikes against Serbia. In exchange, Yugoslavian (i.e., Serbian) President Slobodan Milosevic agreed to 1) a cease-fire; 2) the withdrawal of Serbian forces from Kosovo; 3) the deployment of 2,000 unarmed international observers and NATO reconnaissance flights to monitor the Serbs' compliance; 4) amnesty for Kosovar separatists; and 5) elections in Kosovo within nine months. The spins: 1) Serbia won by avoiding NATO airstrikes. 2) NATO won by using the threat of airstrikes to extract concessions. 3) Milosevic is a proven liar and will resume his aggression when he gets the chance. 4) No, he won't, now that we have observers on the ground. 5) Observers? More like hostages. 6) So what if Milosevic has his fingers crossed about complying? NATO has its fingers crossed about canceling the airstrikes. (10/14/98)

Federal authorities have charged fugitive Eric Rudolph in three more bombings: the 1996 Olympics bombing and the 1997 bombings of an abortion clinic and a gay bar in Atlanta. The hard part is finding Rudolph, who is hiding out in the mountains of North Carolina. The old spin: The feds will bring this abortion-clinic bomber to justice. The new spin: The feds will bring this gay-bar bomber to justice. (10/14/98)