Babwa Wawa Goofs?: Barbara Walters lunched in...

Babwa Wawa Goofs?: Barbara Walters lunched in New York this week with House Speaker Tom Foley, his wife, Heather, and with ABC brass, including Sam Donaldson. Making polite conversation at a lull, Walters asked, “And Mr. Speaker, how’s your dog?” Foley smiled politely and said, “She’s dead.” Donaldson was convulsed with laughter because he knew that Foley’s 16-year-old Belgian shepherd, Alice, died earlier this month. Foley quickly covered for Walters by telling a joke.

* Jackie’s Sacred Ground: Jacqueline Onassis and the Wampanoag Indians are close to settling a dispute over a 264-foot strip of Martha’s Vineyard beach-front property. Agreement may be reached early next year, said Paul Sulla, an attorney for the Wampanoag. “There have been negotiations but we’re not quite there yet,” said Onassis attorney Brian Hurley. Onassis bought a 17% interest in the land in 1980. Since then she has waged a court battle over the remaining land, which is surrounded on three sides by her 380-acre retreat. But descendants of the island’s original settlers want to keep their share of the beach because they say it is sacred.

* PG Only: Shocker sentences start an article by Garry Wills, in the Dec. 21 issue of New York Review of Books. “Of all the men running for President in 1988, only two were forced, by the birth dates of their children, to admit to having had sex with their wives before marriage and those two, Pat Robertson and Jesse Jackson, were the only preachers in the race. To some, that might seem odd; but not to those who know preachers. The pulpit has always been a libidinous zone.”

* Talking Ed: Actor Edward Asner, in Boston Tuesday, teamed with the Boston Pops Orchestra at Symphony Hall for a benefit performance. Asner narrated the classic 1897 New York Sun editorial, “Yes Virginia, There Is a Santa Claus.” The benefit raised $425,000 for the Pops and the Boston Symphony.