Repeat: Is Yeltsin Thinking One More Time?

BORIS YELTSIN seems to be plotting a third presidential term in 2000. Everything he has done recently--from naming a new, malleable Prime Minister to doing a live Q&A on the Internet to bantering with journalists--points that way. So clear are the signs that a well-connected politician, YEGOR STROYEV, citing "intuition," publicly predicted a third Yeltsin term last week.

Yeltsin's election would hardly be automatic. First he must evade a constitutional two-term limit. Yeltsin's aides argue that since his first election in 1991 was under the old Soviet constitution, he has, under the 1993 Russian constitution, served only once. A more practical problem is support. The business and media coalition that backed Yeltsin in 1996 is no more, and his onetime supporters are no longer sure he is electable--or desirable.

Why would Yeltsin run again? One answer, power, is obvious. Another answer is fear. Other top politicians have in their retirement been hounded by corruption charges and been embarrassed by revelations about their private lives.

--By Paul Quinn-Judge/Moscow