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The Senate race in Massachusetts promised everything voters want in an election: two smart, popular candidates...the incumbent Senator, John Kerry, and the current governor of Massachusetts, William Weld; seven issue-oriented debates; and a voluntary limit on campaign spending. But the race has been tight for months and as election day draws near, the mud is flying and the voluntary spending caps both candidates had imposed are off. From member station WBUR, Patrick Cox reports.

Linda talks with BBC reporter Alan Pearce about reaction in Afghanistan to the latest events in Kabul. After the takeover of the nation by the Islamic Taleban military regime, there has been concern about Afghani human rights and possible violations. Women are especially concerned about the new prohibitions on women in the workplace, and many fear leaving their homes after recent beating of women who were simply out doing household shopping.

President Clinton finishes a four-day campaign swing throught the West today, where he hopes to solidify his support...especially in states like Washington. But even though public opinion polls show Clinton well ahead in the presidential race there, some Washington voters are not terribly enthusiastic about re-electing the president. NPR's David Molpus reports.

Republican vice presidential candidate Jack Kemp has a difficult job with the Dole campaign. He wants to stay "above the fray" and preserve his reputation for a possible run for the presidency in the year 2000, but many Dole aides think he needs to be tougher in his attacks on the Clinton administration. Kemp also feels strongly about his supply-side economic proposals and some of those issues are being lost in the final days of the campaign. NPR's Elizabeth Arnold reports.

NPR's Linda Gradstein reports from Jerusalem that behind last month's eruption of violence over an obscure archaeological tunnel lies the bigger issue troubling the city's future: the challenge to the status quo whereby each religion respects and honors the holy places of their rival religions. That Palestinians are sensitive to each and every change in the makeup of Old Jerusalem can be explained by the fact that militant Zionists are insisting on encroaching and praying in the Muslim's holy sanctuary of Haram al Sahrif, on top of the Temple Mount.

The Senate Intelligence Committee today held a hearing on allegations that the CIA played a role in the introduction of crack cocaine into black communites. CIA Inspector General Frederick Hitz (HITS) says there's no evidence the agency helped distribute crack. But he said it might take months to fully exmaine records of the relationship between the CIA and Nicaraguan Contra members implicated in cocaine trafficking in California in the 1980s. NPR's Chitra Ragavan has a report.

NPR's David Baron reports that this year's prize goes to Rolf Zinkernagel and Peter Doherty for work they did in the 1970s on the immune system. They showed that the immune cells, called killer T-cells, must simultaneously recognize an invading organism and a set of proteins produced by the body in order to destroy an invader. This work revolutionized thinking about the immune system, and led to new avenues of therapy for diseases.

NPR's Elizabeth Arnold reports that the presidential race has been jarred by news that Republican candidate Bob Dole sent his campaign manager to Texas to ask Reform Party candidate Ross Perot to withdraw from the race and throw his support to Dole. The move was seen by some as a last-ditch effort by a campaign that's trailing badly in the polls. Perot says he has no intention of leaving the race.

NPR's Anne Garrels reports from Moscow on the inauguration of Russian President Boris Yeltsin for a second term. After the swearing-in ceremony and banquet, Yeltsin left for a two-month vacation. His appearance at the inauguration and his departure raise questions in Russia about his ability to govern the country and deal with the Chechen war. That war is described as being beyond Russian control. Late today, the Chechens proposed a temporary cease fire.

The Supreme Court today heard arguments on a widely watched case involving an Arizona law requiring that official business be conducted only in English. However, as NPR's Nina Totenberg reports, the justices limited all questions to procedural issues and ignored all constitutional ones, indicating that any decision will leave the question of whether states can impose such restrictions unresolved. A number of states have similar measures.