The New York Times

POLITICAL DONATIONS - The Republican Party has quietly created a new platinum standard for its most generous donors, an elite $1 million club whose members are treated to a smorgasbord of benefits like private meetings with Congressional leaders.

TAX CUTS - President Clinton warned the nation's governors that the Republican tax cut would force drastic cutbacks in many programs that could hurt states.

RUSSIA - Russian federal forces, including army units, opened fire from the ground and the air on Islamic militants who late last week occupied four villages along the border with the breakaway republic of Chechnya.

REMEMBERING NIXON - Richard M. Nixon resigned on this day 25 years ago. And knowledge gaps surrounding his fall from grace abound, partly because of the news media's treatment of so many scandals that followed Watergate as if they, too, were constitutional crises.

JORDAN - Jordan's new King, in what many of his subjects consider an effort to better understand the needs of the common people, has started making regular trips through the capital of Amman, all in disguise.

DROUGHT - Record heat and little rain in the New York region have withered berry bushes and dried up streams. Park rangers and naturalists say this has forced bears, and even rattlesnakes, down from the mountains in search of food and water.

JAPAN AND KOREA - Japan is threatening to suspend all cash remittances by Koreans from Japan if North Korea proceeds with plans to test-fire a new long-range ballistic missile.

AT&T-AOL - As AT&T, the nation's biggest telephone company, has marched into the cable television business, it has found itself locked in a battle of legal briefs, lobbying salvos and public relations campaigns against America Online Inc.

ALASKAN PILOTS - State and Federal authorities have started a campaign to equip Alaska's bush pilots with better navigational aids and weather reports. But the authorities and the pilots say there are huge obstacles to cutting accident rates.

SOUTH AFRICAN RUGBY - South Africa's national rugby league has announced that the 14 top teams each must have at least three black players by this time next year, in an effort to speed the game's integration.

And in the sports section:

A report on Virtual Spectator Ltd. an Auckland Internet company that is offering subscribers live coverage of the America's Cup.

"Subscribers to Virtual Spectator will receive a CD-ROM that will open animated 3-D graphics in a virtual-reality format. Each race will be transmitted to individual spectators in real time from the Hauraki Gulf, the race-course site off Auckland. Telemetry data emitted directly from each race boat will provide instantaneous tracking of position and relative speed.

Viewers access the live race coverage by logging on to the World Wide Web with personal computers. Registration for the subscriber service opened last Thursday on the company's Internet site, which is www.virtualspectator.com. Access is limited to 100,000 subscribers worldwide at a one-time cost of $69.95 each."

The article also includes details of further coverage and promotional material for the America's Cup in New York.

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