House Of Representatives U S

Gino Morena of San Francisco is the king of the military haircut, a base barber extraordinaire, a man who has built his livelihood around Army Regulation 1-8. "The hair on the top of the head will be neatly groomed," says the Army policy on hair and fingernail standards. "The length and bulk of the hair will not be excessive or present a ragged, unkempt or extreme appearance.

Temporarily united by a common target, the competing Democratic candidates for president lashed out Friday at congressional Republicans who blocked efforts to restrict sales at gun shows, effectively blaming them for future carnage on America's streets and in its schools. "What is the Congress doing?" a heated Vice President Al Gore rhetorically demanded, speaking in Los Angeles before several hundred Fairfax High School students and supporters in a midday rally in the school's gymnasium.

Surrounded by the grim faces of his House managers, Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.) said Friday that he had "no regrets" about pursuing his six-month crusade against President Clinton. But impeachment's unflagging pilot conceded he may have undermined his case by failing to call witnesses during House hearings and rushing to end the committee's probe last year. "I think we could have got more attention for what we were doing--which was important--by having witnesses," Hyde said.

To vengeful Democrats, Glendale Rep. James E. Rogan is the poster boy for an impeachment-obsessed Republican Congress--poster boy for a hateful gang that tormented their president. Rogan's mug has become a dartboard for the California Democratic Party. Says party spokesman Bob Mulholland: "Rogan is on the endangered species list. . . . He'll need an oxygen tank to survive. . . . He's going to find himself in a boat looking for a life raft. . . ." Choose your metaphor.

Plans for the 2000 census sank further into a partisan quagmire Wednesday as a sharply divided House of Representatives approved a measure allowing local governments to review and challenge whatever figures emerge from the decennial population count. The bill is the Republican answer to Democratic efforts to use a method known as statistical sampling to correct chronic errors in the traditional door-to-door head count.

The House on Tuesday approved a one-year extension of normal trade relations with China, despite recent concerns about the nation's alleged theft of U.S. nuclear secrets and continuing disapproval of Beijing's human rights policies. The 260-170 rejection of an effort to sever normal trade relations with China reaffirmed the political support in Congress for engagement with the world's most populous nation.

Republicans made official on Tuesday their choice of Rep. J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) as the next House speaker, opening the way for what his supporters hope will be a kinder, gentler lower chamber in the new Congress. But analysts and lawmakers say Hastert will face two daunting tasks: To take control of his badly split, often combative party and to reach out to Democrats in an effort to push through major legislation despite a diminished GOP majority.

Note to Monica S. Lewinsky: Don't worry about your deposition Monday for President Clinton's impeachment trial. As far as House prosecutors are concerned, it's No More Mr. Bad Guy--Rep. Ed Bryant (R-Tenn.) will do the questioning. That's the message that House managers wanted to send when they chose Bryant to interrogate the 25-year-old former White House intern in an effort to resolve inconsistencies in previously garnered evidence.

After weeks of circumspect rhetoric, the administration has shifted tactics and is using the White House podium to pound Republicans who are weighing impeachment of the president. As of last week, White House officials still were saying that they hoped for a fair trial. This week, presidential aides attacked the impeachment proceedings as a right-wing effort designed to cause as much pain and embarrassment as possible to President Clinton.

When Rep. John T. Doolittle decided he would boycott the president's State of the Union address last week, he didn't fire off a blistering press release and stomp out of the Capitol in righteous indignation. He went to the dry cleaners, picked up his shirts and called his wife. "I'm not going to the speech. Do you have something planned for dinner or do you want me to bring home some chicken?"