Newsweek certifies the Lippo affair as a major scandal by putting James Riady on the cover. The story untangles the connections between Clinton and the Indonesian Riady family, suggesting that the Riadys' contributions to the Democratic Party bought access to Clinton and Gore, as well as top-level administration jobs for their friends. Clinton and colleagues are "too tolerant of the kind of money-grubbing they vowed four years ago to stop," chides the magazine. Another story bemoans the huge rise in "soft money" donations to both parties, and takes Bob Dole to task for doing favors for donors such as the Gallo wine company. Also, an article explains why the Dow is a lousy indicator of stock market performance (much less the economy): The sample of Dow stocks is too small; the weight given to some stocks is too large. And Newsweek marvels at young people who act like old people (cigars, martinis, and golf, oh my!)

Time's cover story about the Bill Moyers/PBS series Genesis: A Living Conversation echoes Newsweek's inside piece from last week. Like Newsweek, Time lavishly praises the series for its reinterpretation of Genesis. The new reading, which puzzles over God's cruelty and the patriarchs' flaws, is "exhilarating," says Time (though it admits that some religious viewers may consider it old news). In an attached essay, Robert (The Moral Animal) Wright considers Genesis from the perspective of evolutionary biology. Time pays homage to another ancient classic: A long review raves about a new translation of Homer's Odyssey. And an article exposes how powerful anti-Castro Cuban-Americans, including Clinton's sister-in-law, have shaped Clinton's hard-line Cuba policy.

A news-you-can-use cover package. The 1996 Career Guide, subtitled "You, Inc.," suggests that now is the best time ever to be your own boss. Job security and careers are disappearing, replaced by temping and entrepreneurship. U.S. News picks the "Best Jobs for the Future," which include intellectual property lawyer, forensic accountant, and--surprise, surprise--computer technician. Also, yet another soccer mom story: U.S. News profiles one who's probably voting for Clinton. And an article tallies the impact of NAFTA, concluding that it has been neither disaster nor panacea.

The Standard's cover story advances a favorite cause, the California Civil Rights Initiative (CCRI), which would ban all public affirmative-action programs in California. Blasting the "massive mobilization" of big business, academia, and media against the initiative, the article reserves special scorn for the "elite" that declares "affirmative action is too 'complex' to be entrusted to voters." A separate staff editorial hopes that Bob Dole's recent endorsement of CCRI doesn't doom the initiative to defeat. Also, an article indicts police unions for protecting police officers instead of fighting crime (oh, and for endorsing Bill Clinton). And an unkind review of David Brock's The Seduction of Hillary Rodham.
The Nation claims that the Democratic Party has not done enough to fight CCRI in a story about California's election-year politics, whacking Clinton for his "gross abandonment" of poor and minority voters and the Democratic Party for refusing to fund an anti-CCRI media campaign. Also a piece titled "The Unmentionables" lists the five issues Dole and Clinton won't talk about: the bloated defense budget; the need for national health care; the drawbacks of free trade; political upheaval around the world; Social Security. (Social Security? There's no problem with Social Security, says The Nation, but the candidates believe there is a problem with it. They're just not talking about it.)

The Economist brims with techno-skepticism. A cover editorial, titled "Why the Net Should Grow Up," warns that success is spoiling the Internet: Congestion jams lines, crashes servers, and irritates telephone companies (who foot the bill for it), and "[u]sers are driven to distraction by the delays, the muddle and the brainless rubbish." An accompanying article offers a remedy: better pricing schemes. Instead of paying a flat rate for unlimited access, users should be billed based on how much data they send and receive. This will reduce congestion and eliminate free riders. Another story scoffs at robots: They're no good at complicated tasks, and they're fiendishly complicated to program. Humanity can breathe easy again. Also, the Economist's monthly "Review" considers books about the '60s, the American economy, Asia's political woes, and the academy, among other subjects.

A cover story defends the cigarette industry--sort of. In a long review of tobacco books, Malcolm Gladwell argues that smokers have no case against cigarette companies: Even in the '50s, it was common knowledge that smoking was dangerous, and it's preposterous to hold companies liable for the consumers' decision to smoke. Gladwell stakes out a middle ground in the tobacco war: Government shouldn't blame tobacco companies for lung cancer, but it should do everything it can to prevent children from smoking. Also, the editorial uses the occasion of the Lippo scandal to rip U.S. policy toward Indonesia: The Clinton administration should not nurture the Suharto regime, which has slaughtered hundreds of thousands of East Timorese. And TNR becomes the latest publication to discover that Jack Kemp has only one--borrowed--idea.

A double dose of old-fashioned liberalism. The cover story, "Slamming the Door," mourns the federal abandonment of public housing. Author Jason DeParle hammers the Republican Congress and President Clinton for eliminating funds for new building, and warns that the housing gap is widening: Millions of Americans--many of them full-time workers--now spend so much money on shelter that they must cut back on food, clothing, and utilities. "The Un-Candidate" tracks the odd presidential campaign of Ralph Nader, who has hired no staff, raised no money, and given no campaign speeches. There is much praise for Nader's passion, tempered by an acknowledgment that he's losing his war against corporate power. Also, a grim account of the post-Olympic tour by the U.S. women's gymnastics team: America's sweethearts are cold, unhappy, isolated obsessives. And there's yet another article about Bill Moyers' Genesis series.

The New Yorker's special issue on American politics is light on presidential-campaign politics, heavy on profiles. Those featured include George Stephanopoulos; San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown; and Sens. John McCain and John Kerry. The Kristols are touted as today's most influential conservatives in one article and philosopher Michael Oakeshott earns the designation of the century's most influential conservative in another. A story charts the decline of Georgetown as the social center of politics. In keeping with other New Yorker specials, there are celebrity contributions: Richard Holbrooke delivers a long account of his travels in Bosnia; Arthur Miller tells why he wrote The Crucible (uh, McCarthyism); Allen Ginsberg contributes a political poem. And The New Yorker also publishes "Some Like Poetry," a poem by Polish Nobel Prize winner Wislawa Szymborska. The New Republic prints a different translation of the same poem in its Oct. 28 issue.

Madonna on the cover, her endless diary inside. Hooked to the release of Evita, the diary chronicles filming in Buenos Aires, her pregnancy, her dreams about Sharon Stone, and much, much, much more ("[t]oday I died a thousand deaths. Take after painful take. I was a wreck, even off-camera"). Many tender pictures accompany. Marjorie Williams profiles Dick Morris, taking the (now-standard) line that Morris' amorality enabled Clinton to find his own moral center. A Vanity Fair without O.J.? Impossible. "O.J.'s Ghost" recounts the weird career of Larry Schiller, a photographer/media promoter who has insinuated himself with Jack Ruby, Gary Gilmore, and now Simpson. And in a book excerpt, actress Claire Bloom describes the loathsome behavior of her ex-husband, novelist Philip Roth.