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Texas Governor George W. Bush began the final full week of the presidential campaign in the West today, trying to pry loose the biggest prize of all -- California and its trove of 54 electoral votes. Polls show the race tightening on the West Coast, where Bush has been outspending Vice President Al Gore in recent weeks. Gore now plans a return visit of his own to the state this week. NPR's Andy Bowers is based in Southern California and has been following the presidential campaign.

Those ticker tape parades are getting to be routine for the New York Yankees. Kerry Nolan of member station WNYC reports that thousands of New Yorkers lined Broadway's Canyon of Heroes to cheer on the Yankees, who have won four of the past five World Series. Yankee fans considered this year's triumph especially sweet, because it came over the cross-town rival Mets, and because the team had been playing poorly at the end of the season.

Voters in 44 states will elect new legislatures next Tuesday. Although most of the campaigns revolve around local issues like traffic and sprawl, the outcomes are of great importance to both national parties. The state legislatures will draw the boundaries for new Congressional districts next year, giving them the power to erase or augment the gains made by either party in next Tuesday's election. NPR's Pam Fessler went to Blue Bell, Pennsylvania to see how the national attention on the race was affecting one close contest for the state Senate.

NPR's Peter Overby reports on how one group, the Sierra Club is makings its voice heard in the 2000 Presidential campaign by making issue ads. With no limit on what interest groups can collect and spend, issue ads are often one way they advocate for their preferred candidate. Vice President Al Gore is the beneficiary of the issue ad campaign by the Sierra Club, an environmental group.

William Marcus of Montana Public Radio profiles Pete Fromm author of How All This Started, his latest book. The book describes the heart-wrenching struggles of a family dealing with manic depression, and the intuitive bond between a brother and his sister. (7:00) {Stations: Pete Fromm's latest book How All This Started is published by Picador USA; ISBN: 0312209339}

Classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews original cast albums of Broadway musicals that have just been reissued. They include Finians Rainbow, The Pajama Game, Bye Bye Birdie, and Kismit (all on Sony) and Guys and Dolls (on Decca).

Republican leaders in Congress today vowed to stay and fight for their versions of the last few spending bills still pending before adjournment. President Clinton has threatened to veto the bills in current form because the spending levels and various policy changes are not to his liking. That means the legislators might not get out of town before Election Day a week from tomorrow. NPR's Brian Naylor reports.

A remembrance for comedian Steve Allen, who has died of an apparent heart attack at the age of 78. Allen was a pioneer of late night TV, as the original host of The Tonight Show on NBC in 1954. His prolific career in entertainment also included record albums, movies, Broadway shows, work as a disc jockey and forty books.

Robert talks to Richard Vara, religion editor for the Houston Chronicle, about the vote by the Baptist General Convention in Texas to withhold millions of dollars in funding from the Southern Baptist Convention. The Texas branch of the denomination cited concerns about the increasingly conservative positions taken by the national leadership of the church.

Both Democrat Al Gore and Republican George W. Bush say they support a patients' bill of rights, and both make the issue part of the daily stump speeches. But while Gore has been very specific about his support for a bill that is stalled in Congress, Bush has kept avoided talk of too many details. As NPR's Julie Rovner reports, Bush's generalities about the issues sometimes conflict with one another, but not so much as to roil voters.