CLINTON . . . HUD CUTS TO TAX CUTS?

President Clinton, adopting a policy initiative he's spoken of but ignored for most of his term, may announce a middle class tax cut in a televised speech scheduled for 9 pm ET Thursday, White House aides said today. Clinton has been expected to hit the airwaves since last week -- when the White House promised an address to follow up on his fence-mending speech to the centrist Democratic Leadership Council -- and Sunday, Clinton said he would propose the tax cut if he could find a way to pay for it. How? TIME White House correspondent James Carney says the leading solution's hidden in plain sight: preliminary Administration proposals revealed last week to scrap the Department of Housing and Urban Development, as well as other federal agencies and dozens of federal programs. "This is all about a search for money to pay for a tax cut -- and about looking like he got the message from the November elections," Carney says. Look for a cut targeted "right in the middle of the middle class," Carney adds, including ever-popular child tax credits.