Ability

WASHINGTON -- President Bush's spin team still calls him "a uniter not a divider." But the description rings hollow after Vermont Sen. James Jeffords' departure from the Republican Party. When it counted, Dubya couldn't even keep his own senators united. Unity is a make-or-break proposition in a 50-50 Senate, where keeping all of your fellow partisans in line is about as easy as juggling 50 balls in the air -- or maybe 50 hand grenades. Drop one and you lose your majority and your ability to set the body's agenda.

PONTIAC, Mich. -- It took an end zone interception of Warren Moon's Hail Mary pass with no time left to end one of the wildest games in the Detroit Lions' Thanksgiving Day history, a 44-38 victory over Minnesota before 74,559 in the Silverdome.Quarterback Scott Mitchell threw a career high of four touchdown passes and broke Bobby Layne's 45-year-old game passing record with 410 yards.Barry Sanders rushed for 137 yards on 14 carries in the second half, including a 53-yard run that ended in a fumble and a 50-yarder that ended in a touchdown.

The concerns do not bother Texas A&M running back Leeland McElroy. Several NFL scouts had the same doubts about the Detroit Lions' Barry Sanders and the Indianapolis Colts' Marshall Faulk."

If practice makes perfect, then it's easy to explain why Atholton's boys basketball team looked less than perfect Friday night.The team has had trouble getting 10 players out to practice this season. And the resulting lack of teamwork was clearly evident in its 71-59 loss to Sherwood."We're not executing," Raider Coach Jim Albert said. "At any given time, we have three players on the court who know what to do and two who don't."After Friday night's loss in the opening round of the first Central Maryland Basketball Classic, held by Atholton, Albertdrew the line.

If you want to find out how good Overlea High running back Tyrese Barmer is, don't clock him in the 40-yard -- and don't watch him practice."He has a certain time in the 40 and he also has a certain time when ,14l you give him the ball," said Overlea coach Terry Ward. "He doesn't talk a lot and he's not a great practice player, but we forgive him when game time comes."With good reason.With three regular-season games remaining, Barmer, a junior, has rushed for 934 yards, 11 touchdowns and nine two-point conversions to lead the Falcons to a 7-0 record and the area's No. 6 ranking.

While the Spirit played at home Saturday, leading scorer Franklin McIntosh was on the road. Suspended for violating team rules last week, McIntosh returned to the team yesterday."

Federal prosecutors want to seize the $400,000 to be paid to former state Sen. Thomas Bromwell Sr. in return for his stepping down from the leadership of Maryland's largest insurance fund for injured employees. In papers filed in U.S. District Court in Baltimore, Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein argued that the severance package Bromwell received last month from the Injured Workers' Insurance Fund should be targeted for forfeiture as part of the public corruption case against the Baltimore County Democrat.

President Clinton is about to select his first nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court. In the next few months, Governor Schaefer will get an opportunity to fill key vacancies in Maryland's two highest courts. It's a good time to rethink the criteria for selecting judges.The traditional vision of the ideal judge, long embraced by both the legal establishment and the public, is one who is ''detached'' and ''impartial.'' The model jurist renders decisions without regard to personal values, beliefs or experiences.

Manchester,N H. --- FOR DEMOCRATS seeking a presidential nominee, debates like the one here the other night are a kind of trap.Although there were a few cheap shots and grandstand plays, the five candidates spent most of the two hours demonstrating a sophisticated grasp of complex domestic problems. It is fair to say that all five showed an ability to articulate their concerns and solutions that the notoriously inarticulate President Bush would be hard-pressed to match.But the problem for the Democrats is that the issues on which they focused most intently -- the economy, trade, tax policy, education -- are unlikely to be the pivotal ones in the general election campaign next fall.

WASHINGTON -- At a coffee in Wilkes-Barre a few days before the Pennsylvania primary, Lynn Yeakel was asked for her views on the "notch babies." As she cheerfully admitted later, she had no idea who the "notch babies" might be.In another year, the idea of a leading candidate for the U.S. Senate who didn't know about the notch babies would have been unthinkable. For 15 years now, presidential and Senate and House candidates have become accustomed to being confronted by representatives of this group -- Americans born between 1917 and 1926 who because of an anomaly in the law receive lower Social Security benefits than others who came before and after them.