A Week in the World August 31, 1998 It was a week of collapse at home and abroad. In the United States Democratic support eroded for President Bill Clinton after he lied about, and then admitted, an extramarital affair with a White House intern. House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt and Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan were among the prominent members of the president's own party who lambasted Mr. Clinton for lying to the American people. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich hinted darkly that the president would never be impeached over a single criminal trespass--such as his lying under oath to lawyers representing Paula Jones-- leaving the suggestion in the air that the forthcoming report on Mr. Clinton's messy legal, financial, and sexual escapades from Special Prosecutor Kenneth Starr would offer Congress a rich and voluminous mine of Clintonian illegalities. Meanwhile embattled Vice President Al Gore discovered that he himself would be the target of a special prosecutor, after Attorney General Janet Reno said charges of illegal campaign fundraising against Mr. Gore were sufficient to warrant an investigation. Around the world financial markets underwent meltdown, as Russia's ruble finally collapsed. Japan's Nikkei Index hit a 12-year low; shudders were felt on stock exchanges as far away as Brazil, Canada, and Mexico. Russian leader Boris Yeltsin appeared unfocused and frail as he appeared on television to assure his nation and the world that he would not step down from power before the expiration of hi s presidential term in 2000. The Duma rejected Mr. Yeltsin's appointment of Victor Chernomyrdin as prime minister; Russian citizens rushed banks to withdraw their savings. Scott Ritter, a former Marine and the longest-serving U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq, resigned, claiming that neither Washington nor the United Nations any longer had the political will to challenge Saddam Hussein over his allegedly ongoing chemical and biological weapons program. He called the current inspections a "farce" and accused the United States of quashing at least six inspections of sensitive Iraqi sites because it did not want to anger Saddam. Actor E.G. Marshall died, aged 88. Oleg Prokofiev, son of the composer and a distinguished artist, died, aged 69. Paul Willert, the oil baron active in the French resistance during World War II, died, aged 89. The former head of the Scottish Nationalist Party, Allan Macartney, died, aged 57. Washington and London withdrew their longstanding demand that the two Libyans suspected of the Lockerbie bombing that killed 270 people stand trial in either Britain or the U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said the U.S. now would agree to have the two suspects, both Libyan intelligence officers, stand trial in the Netherlands. Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi said he would accept the offer unconditionally, then changed his mind and demanded "guarantees" about the fate of the men before extraditing them for trial. Some 500,000 people fled the path of Hurricane Bonnie, which turned out to be much less destructive than predicted. An American newspaper said Osama bin Laden, the Saudi terrorist suspected of masterminding the U.S. embassy bombings in Africa, twice tried to have Bill Clinton assassinated. A 53-year-old woman in England claimed she was the half-sister of murdered Beatle John Lennon, and said she had kept the news secret for so many years in order not to upset her adoptive mother. In India 45 people were killed after drinking homemade arrack laced with wood spirit, and another 32 died of dropsy after consuming contaminated mustard oil. The Planet Hollywood restaurant in Cape Town, South Africa was bombed, maiming several people including an 8-year-old girl. Priscilla Presley was awarded nearly $100,000 in libel damages over a report that she was not a virgin when she married Elvis. Ms. Presley met the singer when she was 14 and married him seven years later. An Israeli newspaper reported that the Mossad, Israel's secret service, borrowed the plot of the 1962 film The Manchurian Candidate and tried to brainwash a Palestinian into assassinating Yasser Arafat in the 1970's. Australia admitted sterilizing more than 200 retarded girls, some as young as nine, between 1992 and 1997. Tourists at a South Africa game preserve saw their tour guide get devoured by a leopard. A 24-year-old fisherman was found alive in the Pacific after drifting in his boat for two months. Feminist author Germaine Greer was banned from driving in Britain for two weeks after being caught racing home at 101 mph to protect her geese. An 83-year-old farmer in England was banned from driving after being caught racing home at 1 mph. In England a young couple making love in a graveyard were crushed when they knocked over a tombstone in their ardor; the woman freed herself and ran to get rescue workers, who returned to find the man was wearing ladies' white stockings. Researchers found that "happy" music, such as concerti by Albioni, helps students learn more and achieve higher grades; the music of avant-garde jazz saxophonist John Coltrane made the pupils "anti-social." A British professor became the first human being to be implanted with a silicon intelligence chip, which was placed on his elbow. "Lights go on and computers burst into life every time I scratch my head," he said. "It is quite frightening."
