January 5, 1992

In his budget request to Congress later this month, President Bush intends to propose tax credits to help people buy health insurance, further cuts in military spending and major new restrictions on the payment of Government benefits to the affluent, Administration officials say. Mr. Bush's advisers say the tax credits will be the centerpiece of his election-year strategy to show that he has a substantial domestic policy and to fend off attacks by Democrats who contend he has no plan to aid the 34 million Americans who lack health insurance.

EVEN by the rigorous standards of an American election year, Tokyo is a long way to go to try to win votes back home. But in his three-day visit this week to Japan, President Bush will be doing precisely that, prodding the Japanese to open their markets and buy more American goods to help, he says, "create jobs and restore prosperity" in the United States. Mr. Bush and his advisers recognize that with the end of the cold war and the collapse of the Soviet Union, the international threat that most worries voters is no longer nuclear warfare but something far more subtle -- an erosion of living standards as American industries lag in the global competition with foreign rivals, especially Japan. And those concerns have been magnified by recent announcements from pillars of corporate America, like General Motors and I.B.M., that they are cutting thousands of workers and permanently shrinking.

Somewhere deep in his mind, John Elway must play these moments again and again, perhaps as much for pleasure as preparation. One day, he will need to rewind and repeat them. Five years after his most glorious moment with the Denver Broncos -- a 98-yard touchdown drive against the Cleveland Browns -- Elway engaged in heroics once more. This time, it brought the Broncos from behind to a 26-24 victory today over the stunned Houston Oilers and into the American Football Conference championship game.

Special Today: Education Life/Section 4A A special report spotlights what works in education. Also: Held back to get ahead. The course not taken. Hooked on ad claims? A worldly quiz.

TOM SCOTT likes to brag that he is the person most disliked by Gov. Lowell P. Weicker Jr. Mr. Scott, a conservative Republican and self-appointed leader of the revolt against the state income tax, is a former State Senator who also boasts of his unpopularity among his onetime colleagues in the General Assembly. Governor Weicker, with whom he has had a few well-publicized run-ins, refuses to confirm or refute Mr. Scott's claim to the title of No. 1 irritant. But others at the State Capitol are not as generous.