WASHINGTON INSIGHT

UP, UP AND AWAY? Speculation mounts about the future of White House Chief of Staff John H. Sununu after President Bush’s decision to strip him of authority to use military aircraft for personal and political trips without presidential approval.

Although top White House aides insist publicly there are no plans to dump Sununu any time soon, Bush-watchers say there’s little doubt that the former New Hampshire governor--whose often abrasive style has left him with relatively few fans in the capital--will be a decidedly less-formidable power in the wake of the stunning rebuke by Bush. Conservatives point out that Sununu has stubbed his toe before, but later exhibited extraordinary staying-power. Still, “I wouldn’t be surprised if this were the beginning of the end” for Sununu, one well-placed observer says.

The Sununu affair also reveals some strains among the President’s men. Analysts say last week’s White House report on the scandal, authored by presidential counsel C. Boyden Gray--who occasionally has clashed with Sununu--contains hints that Gray may have used the opportunity to settle some old scores. And the logs of Sununu’s trips to ski resorts and to visit his Boston dentist--made public two weeks ago--are controlled by National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, another powerful Sununu adversary.

CLEAR SHOT: The Brady gun-control legislation seems likely to become law within a few weeks even though President Bush has insisted that Democrats also approve his comprehensive anti-crime package in order to escape a presidential veto.

While initial assessments suggested that Bush’s demand might well kill the Brady bill, last week’s strong 239-186 majority in the House in favor of mandating a seven-day waiting period for handgun purchases has made Senate Democrats more willing to compromise on the White House crime package. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), who previously resisted the Bush plan, is reported ready to negotiate over the President’s call for curbing appeals by Death Row prisoners and other elements of the White House package.

And Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) has dropped his longtime opposition to waiting periods for handgun purchases and is offering a compromise of his own. Mitchell proposes that Washington help finance the expensive computerization of criminal records that would be needed to provide instant background checks for handgun-purchasers, as suggested by the National Rifle Assn.

The legislation is named for James S. Brady, the former White House press secretary who was wounded in the 1981 assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan.

FED UP? Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan draws new brickbats over the central bank’s decision to cut interest rates two weeks ago.

Though Fed authorities insist that the decision was made solely on economic grounds, critics are blasting it as a cave-in to the Bush Administration, which had been pressuring Greenspan to cut rates despite widespread fears that such action would backfire in the financial markets and only worsen the outlook for inflation. The Economist, the British newsmagazine, archly rebukes what it calls “the diminished Fed.” And, in a rare rejoinder, Lee Hoskins, one of the Fed’s hard-liners on inflation, breaks ranks with other board members to criticize the decision implicitly in a speech.