July 12, 1992

WHEN the All-Star Game is played Tuesday in San Diego, the state of New York baseball will be too apparent: one player each from the Mets and the Yankees. As if these were the Mets of a decade ago with John Stearns as their only selection, or the Yankees of two decades ago with Bobby Murcer. The All-Star Game is not to be taken seriously, but its rosters are. The most players are supplied by the best teams.

It has become a cliche of the American political hero: The candidate off in the provinces, planning and dreaming his way to the nomination, believing while others despair, thinking while others rest. In the case of Bill Clinton, who will accept his party's Presidential nomination on Thursday night, there is some truth to it. Article, page 18.

As the cast of characters for the 41st Democratic National Convention assembled in Manhattan yesterday, the Rev. Jesse Jackson ended a long holdout and endorsed Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas and Senator Al Gore of Tennessee -- the ticket the delegates will ratify later this week. Mr. Clinton, who has seemed to regain his political equilibrium in recent days, won Mr. Jackson's backing, however grudging and however tardy, on his own terms. Unlike other recent Democratic nominees, he declined to bargain with the black leader for his support, lest he seem a captive.

WHEN 4,288 delegates and more than 600 alternates gather in Madison Square Garden tomorrow for the hollering and hooting that will mark the four-day Democratic National Convention, 44 Long Islanders will be among the delegates and 7 will be alternates. They will be part of the massive influx of politically active citizens participating in a ritual that dates to 1832, when Democrats and Republicans convened their first national conventions to nominate, respectively, Andrew Jackson and Henry Clay.

Countering what they perceive as unwarranted optimism after the Munich summit meeting this week, high-ranking Bush Administration officials say the meeting did not produce substantial progress toward a 108-nation agreement aimed at lowering world trade barriers. Carla A. Hills, the United States Trade Representative, said Friday that the Munich meeting left unchanged the stalemate in farm trade negotiations with the European Community. "I'm tempted to say they're not affected," she said, "because in effect we still don't have a proposal from the Europeans."