Daily Briefing

Update

A woman in whose home a male stripper performed for her 15-year-old daughter's slumber party has accepted a plea deal that will most likely keep her out of jail. Carye McGrath, 39, pleaded no contest in Pleasanton, Calif., to a misdemeanor count of contributing to the delinquency of minors. The stripper, Steven Schmitt, 29, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of lewd and lascivious conduct. About 40 girls attended the Oct. 30 party. McGrath says her daughter arranged for the stripper without her knowledge and admits she made a mistake in letting him in.

People

-- As he attacked President's Clinton character during the 1996 presidential campaign, little could Bob Dole have envisioned being one day linked to the symbol of Clinton's problems, Monica Lewinsky. But now he is, as owner of Lewinsky's condominium at the posh Watergate in Washington, D.C. It's the two-bedroom pad where Lewinsky engaged in phone sex with the president. In one of its closets hung the stained blue dress.

-- Actor Gary Busey was released on bail in Los Angeles yesterday after being arrested for allegedly wrestling his wife to the ground during an argument, police said. Busey, 54, was arrested after his wife, Tianna, called police to the couple's home in Malibu. He was charged with one count of misdemeanor spousal battery.

Today in history

-- In 1880, Thomas Edison received a patent for his electric incandescent lamp.

-- In 1885, Jerome Kern, U.S. composer regarded as the father of the modern musical, was born.

-- In 1951, an era of atomic testing in the Nevada desert began as an Air Force plane dropped a one-kiloton bomb on Frenchman Flats.

-- In 1967, astronauts Virgil "Gus" Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chaffee died in a flash fire during a test aboard their Apollo I spacecraft at Cape Kennedy, Fla.

P.S.

An Oakland city committee yesterday slapped down a proposal to set up America's first official "No Spanking Zone," voting instead to protect parents' right to whack their children. The City Council's Public Safety Committee voted 2-1 against the "no spank" proposal put forward by Jordan Riak, a child-welfare advocate who is campaigning against corporal punishment.