Washington State

WASHINGTON -- As the fall campaign sprint begins, Al Gore and George W. Bush are zeroing in on America's heartland for what could be the closest presidential contest in a generation. New national voter surveys being released this week are expected to show that Gore has succeeded in wiping out Bush's yearlong advantage in the opinion polls. Most recent polls have shown them running dead even, though a Newsweek survey this weekend gives Gore a 10-point edge. At the same time, the electoral map indicates a considerable tightening in the state-by-state competition since last month's Democratic convention, when Gore's campaign began to take off. The vice president has chipped away at Bush's electoral-vote advantage, gaining in states such as New Jersey and Minnesota.

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court ruled unanimously yesterday that the problem of oil spills from huge tanker ships must be handled mainly by the federal government, not the states. The justices struck down rules on tanker operation that Washington state imposed to protect its waters, including Puget Sound, after the oil spill in Alaska in 1989 from the tanker Exxon Valdez. The decision also raised doubts about a dozen other Washington state rules on tanker operation. "Congress has left no room for state regulation" of tanker design, construction, operation and crew manning, the court said in an opinion written by Justice Anthony M. Kennedy.

A 35-year-old Alaskan oil pipeline worker was charged yesterday with traveling to Maryland intending to have sex with a 13-year-old boy, who was an undercover FBI agent on the Internet. Larry Breshears, a welding inspector for the North Slope Alaska oil fields, was arrested at an Annapolis hotel after flying into Baltimore-Washington International Airport to meet "Josh," the undercover name used by the agent, 31-year-old Stacey M. Bradley. Bradley met Breshears in December in an America Online chat room, where she was posing as a child as part of the FBI's Innocent Images program.

WASHINGTON -- Authorities arrested last night a Russian diplomat believed to be an intelligence officer who had sought classified information from the State Department, U.S. officials said.The officials said that the case involved a substantial Russian espionage effort aimed at pilfering sensitive information about U.S. activities abroad.The Russian diplomat works out of Moscow's embassy in Washington and was arrested in the Washington area, U.S. officials said. They declined to identify the diplomat.

We trudged up the wooded path from the parking lot of Lime Kiln Point State Park, the so-called "whale-watching park" of Washington's San Juan Island, armed with borrowed binoculars, jackets and hope. It was only 10 a.m., with fog still hanging in the air. Surely the time for orcas to linger in the spot where everyone always said they were seen.Then we saw the handwritten sign: "Whales went north at 9:30 a.m."Yeah, right, we sniggered, clambering onto the rocks and listening to the plaintive wail of the little white lighthouse.

WASHINGTON -- Voters in Alaska and Hawaii, in the most decisive defeats yet for homosexual marriages, took that issue out of their courts Tuesday to head off potential rulings in favor of such unions.Those were the first states where it has appeared likely that same-sex marriage would become a state constitutional right. If either state allowed such unions, other states might have to recognize the marriages if the couples moved or traveled elsewhere.In Alaska, voters by a 68-32 percent margin rewrote the state constitution to declare that no marriage in the state is legal unless it is "between one man and one woman."

In a finding that could spur other Democrats to make voter distaste for an impeachment inquiry a campaign issue, a poll made public yesterday found that former Rep. Jay Inslee, a Democrat running for the House in Washington state, has gained ground since he began running a commercial criticizing the impeachment process.The survey, commissioned by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, found that Inslee has pulled statistically even with the Republican incumbent, Rick White. While the race has long been competitive, Democratic officials said that represented a significant turnabout for Inslee, who was trailing White by several points two weeks ago.The latest poll was conducted this past weekend, about a week after Inslee began running an advertisement castigating White for voting for a Republican proposal to begin a broad, open-ended inquiry into possible grounds for the impeachment of President Clinton.

A grand jury in Baltimore has indicted two men in killings that occurred more than 15 years ago. One had been a fugitive longer than any other suspect in a homicide in recent Baltimore history.The charges against Ben David Ross, 55, and Orlando Padgett, 41, announced yesterday, followed the indictment last week of a man charged with a killing that stymied police for 30 years.Assistant State's Attorney Mark Cohen, chief of the office's homicide unit, said the indictments are the result of fresh information and good old-fashioned luck.

PASADENA, Calif. -- Washington State quarterback Ryan Leaf has been the other guy all year, so why should the 84th Rose Bowl be any different?He was buried under Peyton Manning's press clippings all season and overlooked by the Heisman voters and, well, pretty much misunderstood by everyone from the residents of his hometown in Great Falls, Mont., to the national media.So, why not tomorrow, when he will take the field against Heisman Trophy winner Charles Woodson and the supposedly soon-to-be-crowned national champion Michigan Wolverines?

WASHINGTON -- Stepping into the breach left by the departure of Rep. Jim McDermott, Rep. Benjamin L. Cardin of Baltimore yesterday became the senior Democratic negotiator on the House ethics committee in the case against Speaker Newt Gingrich.McDermott withdrew from consideration of the case on Tuesday, after it was revealed that he was given a tape of a cellular phone call involving the speaker that was later leaked to reporters.The replacement of McDermott with Cardin was greeted with relief by Republicans as well as Democrats because Cardin is less flamboyant and partisan than McDermott and is considered more evenhanded.