WASHINGTON INSIGHT

A BRIDGE TOO CROWDED: If diplomacy is the ability to finesse tricky situations, credit one unsung success to a member of Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s personal staff on her recent swing through the Balkans. The place was Brcko, one of the most volatile areas of Bosnia, the event a bridge-opening ceremony with Albright as the main attraction. The problem: How to tell the 20 high-ranking political figures who had suddenly shown up from all over the Balkans that only two or three could actually participate. Enter the 20-something Kitty Bartels, who, arriving at the bridge only a few minutes ahead of the secretary’s motorcade, sized up the situation and went to work. “If you are a prime minister, please raise your hand,” she requested. Three hands dutifully went in the air. “Fine,” she declared. “The rest of you please move to the side.” Problem solved.

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ANOTHER HUANG SUBPOENAED: The Senate committee investigating fund-raising practices has subpoenaed Jane Huang of Glendale, the wife of former Democratic fund-raiser John Huang. The subpoena was issued after The Times reported that Jane Huang was credited on Democratic National Committee forms with soliciting $37,000 from three associates of her husband before he left the Commerce Department--where he was prohibited from fund-raising--to join the DNC at the end of 1995. Jane Huang’s name also appears as solicitor for a fourth donation--for $15,000--from another acquaintance of John Huang while he was at Commerce, according to people familiar with the documents. Mr. Huang has refused to cooperate with Senate or federal investigators; Mrs. Huang is expected to do the same.

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LIFE IS HARD: Striding through the Capitol’s Statuary Hall one recent afternoon on his way to a meeting in the House speaker’s office, Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), leader of the House probe of improper fund-raising practices, was heard to complain: “Ever since this investigation began, my . . . golf game has gone to hell.”

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WELL, NOT THAT HARD: The outright ban on gifts to members of Congress that was passed with much fanfare in 1995 didn’t prevent 14 lawmakers--all but two of them Republicans--from participating in the Kemper Open Pro-Am Tournament held outside Washington last week. The tab for lobbyists and others who wanted to play the exclusive TPC at Avenel course with the likes of Greg Norman and Corey Pavin was $3,500 per person. Not so for members of Congress, who were invited by the Kemper Insurance Cos. to play at no cost. The lawmakers, including Burton and Rep. Ron Packard (R-Oceanside), received letters from the House and Senate ethics panels exempting the Kemper Open from the ban on freebies because it is considered a “charity” event.

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NO TEXTUAL DEVIATE: Warren Christopher, James A. Baker III and other recent secretaries of State regularly gave their speech writers nightmares by inserting into their carefully crafted prose such phrases as “to be quite frank.” But not Madeleine Albright. Albright reads a text about as well as anyone in public life. But she sometimes reads what she’s been given even when it is out of sync. Take her commencement speech at Harvard last week. Clearly directed at this year’s graduating class, the text frequently compared the challenges of Albright’s generation with those facing the graduates. “It may be hard for you, who have no memory of that time 50 years ago, to understand,” she said at one point. But at Harvard the speeches are given not to the new graduates but to a gathering of alumni. Albright’s audience included graduates of classes going back to 1917.