FIRST STRIKE: The White House last week...

FIRST STRIKE: The White House last week quietly helped torpedo Random House’s attempt to sell excerpts of former presidential advisor Dick Morris’ kiss-and-tell book to Newsweek. Random House was frantically negotiating with the newsmagazine to run the juiciest nuggets written by the political strategist, who resigned after a tabloid reported that he shared confidential White House documents with a prostitute. But then a copy mysteriously turned up in the hands of the Washington Post. And when a Barnes & Noble bookstore in Manhattan mistakenly put the book on sale early, White House officials gleefully spread the word to news organizations. Newsweek backed out of the sale, saying it had no interest in paying as much as $50,000 for material that was not exclusive. But shed no tears for Morris. Random House paid him $2.5 million.

*

SECOND THOUGHT: The vice president’s office is shifting its position regarding what Al Gore knew about the $140,000 Democratic fund-raiser he attended last spring at a Buddhist temple in Hacienda Heights, Calif., which he and party officials have since conceded was an improper use of a tax-exempt religious group. Three months ago, Gore insisted that he believed it was nothing more than “a community outreach” event. Recently released documents show the party had alerted his office in advance that the luncheon was arranged primarily for donors. On Tuesday, Gore spokeswoman Lorraine Voles said: “He knew it was a finance-related event.” Look for Republican congressional committees to vigorously pursue Gore’s changing accounts.

*

NO THANKS: After helping Bill Clinton nail down the liberal support needed for the 1992 Democratic nomination, Harold M. Ickes came to the White House as deputy chief of staff and took on the new president’s toughest challenges. The cantankerous aide organized support for health care reform, coordinated the Whitewater defense and helped chart the course to renomination. Friends of Ickes hoped his efforts would earn him a prestigious new post. But liberals are in low demand in Clinton’s second term, and this week it was learned that Ickes’ only reward will be another thankless task: managing the G-7 economic summit in Denver in June, which will require balancing the demands and egos of six visiting chiefs of government. “The best thing about this job,” quipped an Ickes pal, “is that it only lasts six months.”

*

JUSTICE DEPARTURES: Atty. Gen. Janet Reno may be staying, but her top staff is hitting the door. First Deval Patrick, the assistant attorney general for civil rights, announced in November that he was returning to Boston to practice law. In December, Associate Atty. Gen. John Schmidt, the No. 3 at Justice, submitted his resignation to return home to Chicago. And on Tuesday, Deputy Atty. Gen. Jamie S. Gorelick said she was vamoosing. Gorelick, the department’s No. 2 official, was seen as a possible replacement for Reno had the latter not remained for a second term.

*

SPEAKER PHONE: House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s latest political misfortune has been cleverly retooled into a sales pitch by a New York firm. Said a full-page newspaper ad Tuesday: “Dear Mr. Speaker: If you’d rather not have your phone conversation overheard and printed word for word in the newspaper, next time use an Omnipoint wireless phone instead of a cellular phone.” The new digital technology, available in a growing number of major markets, encrypts voices, which means they cannot be eavesdropped upon by, say, a couple of Democratic Party political junkies with a tape recorder in Florida.