Campaign Briefs

Dole trailing Clinton in money In the final days of the campaign, Bob Dole is trailing President Clinton not only in the polls, but also at the bank.

Dole had $19 million and Clinton had $32 million left to spend as of Oct. 16, according to final financial reports of the season filed on Thursday.

Reform Party nominee Ross Perot - who started with half as much as Dole and Clinton - had $13.8 million left.

Because the candidates accepted taxpayer financing, Dole and Clinton are limited to spending $74 million apiece on their fall campaigns. The political parties, however, have provided millions of dollars in help to both candidates through television ads promoting Republican and Democratic issues - spending they contend is outside limits imposed on the campaigns.

Anti-government attitude recedes

Americans are feeling less hostile toward government and their own members of Congress since Republicans won control of the House and Senate by exploiting anti-Washington sentiment, a poll suggests.

That development hasn’t clearly benefited one party over the other in congressional races, the Pew Research Center survey found.

Among likely voters, 48 percent said they intended to vote for Democratic congressional candidates and 44 percent favored Republicans.

But when asked which party should control Congress if Clinton wins, 46 percent said Republicans and 42 percent said Democrats.

Much of the anger people felt about government two years ago seems to be gone. Only 19 percent in the poll said they don’t want their representative re-elected, down from 30 percent in October 1994.

Clinton cookie still tops

Never mind the presidential race. In the sweet tooth sweepstakes, the Clinton chocolate chip cookie wins again.

Hillary Rodham Clinton’s chocolate chip recipe was favored over Elizabeth Dole’s pecan roll concoction in Family Circle’s “Second National Bipartisan Cookie Cook-Off,” the magazine said Thursday.

The first lady’s recipe won the approval of 55.4 percent of readers who sent back postcards from the magazine’s Sept. 1 issue, said Family Circle spokeswoman Shawn McCormack.

Family Circle will publish the results in its Jan. 7 edition.