Week In Review A Look Back At The Top Stories From The Last Week

POLITICS

You get what you pay for

“I think next time I will give $600,000,” said Roger Tamraz - oilman, Lebanese fugitive and CIA asset, whose $300,000 campaign contribution to the Democratic Party won him access to the Clinton White House.

Tamraz’s testimony before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee last week was perhaps the most candid of any witness who has appeared. Though he gained access, his proposal to build an oil pipeline from the oil-rich Caspian Sea region to the Mediterranean was denied.

“I’m saying that I did believe my contribution gave me access. It’s the only reason, to get access,” Tamraz told the committee. “But what I’m saying is once you have access, what do you do with it?”

Despite the levity that marked Tamraz’s testimony, the committee focused Thursday on serious allegations of influence peddling.

On Wednesday, former White House official Sheila Heslin testified before the committee she had been pressured to sign off on a meeting between Tamraz and President Clinton, despite a White House background check concluding Tamraz was unreliable.

Kiss off

Former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld gave up Monday on trying to be the U.S. ambassador to Mexico.

“I think Sen. Helms is where the problem is,” Weld said of Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms, R-N.C., who single-handedly blocked the nomination.

In announcing his decision, Weld cast himself as Main Street’s hero vs. Helms, whom he depicted as the tyrant inside the Beltway.

“Washington sure is a funny town,” Weld said in reviewing his fate. He said all he wanted was a fair hearing, but the wise men of Washington told him, “‘First you have to go on bended knee and you have to kiss a lot of rings.’ So I said I wouldn’t go on bended knee, and I wouldn’t kiss anything.”

Later, Slade

Sen. Slade Gorton agreed Tuesday to drop his proposals ending Indian tribes’ longstanding immunity from civil lawsuits and cutting federal funding for tribes making money off casino gambling.

But in backing down, the Washington Republican gained important concessions that ensure both issues will be revisited next year.

HEALTH

Drugs shelved

On Monday, the diet drugs fenfluramine, sold as Pondimin, and dexfenfluramine, sold as Redux, were removed from the market after new evidence linked them to potentially serious heart valve problems, effectively ending the commonly known fen-phen combination that had been popular among those seeking to shed pounds.

An FDA analysis of heart tests on 291 patients using the drugs has found almost a third - 92 people - had damaged heart valves, even though many had no symptoms. “These findings call for prompt action,” said Dr. Michael Friedman, acting FDA commissioner.

Smoke clears

With only a cursory debate and a voice vote, the House joined the Senate Wednesday in voting to repeal the $50 billion tax credit for tobacco companies that Republican leaders inserted into this summer’s budget deal with President Clinton.

The provision - written by a tobacco lobbyist and inserted into the budget agreement by Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., and House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga. - was designed to reduce the financial impact of a proposed $368.5 billion settlement to resolve a raft of health-related lawsuits filed by states.

Clinton called on Congress Wednesday to rewrite the settlement to impose sharply higher penalties on cigarette companies and tighter government control over the products they sell. By recommending the changes, Clinton all but doomed prospects that Congress will be able to approve any settlement this year and left open whether efforts to substantially alter the fragile accord will lead to its improvement or its collapse.

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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Compiled by News Editor Kevin Graman from wire reports