The Morning Line

By PAUL GRAY/

Federal officials now admit that the S&L disaster could cost $500 billion over the next 30 years. Still, insiders expect the Senate ethics committee, using * shamefully correct everybody-does-it logic, to go easy on the Keating Five -- the Senators who collected nearly $1.4 million in campaign donations from Charles Keating, of the bankrupt Lincoln Savings and Loan. Voters are likely to be harsher.

ALAN CRANSTON (up for re-election in 1992). The California Democrat is considered not only a lame duck but a dead duck. An aide concedes, "He won by only 3% last time. He's never been a good bet in '92."

DENNIS DECONCINI (1994). The Arizona Democrat's approval rating has never quite recovered from his damaging association with the S&L king. He will hang on only if there is an outbreak of amnesia.

DONALD RIEGLE (1994). Fifty-five percent of voters say they'll think twice about re-electing the Michigan Democrat, who was a leading member of the banking committee during the crisis.

JOHN MCCAIN (1992). Unlike his Arizona colleague, this Republican apologized early and often for his involvement with Keating. The Vietnam War POW will likely survive the next election.

JOHN GLENN (1992). The Ohio Democrat has heard boos at home, a once unthinkable phenomenon. But he is, after all, the first American to orbit the earth. It will take a bigger legend to beat him.

With reporting by DAVID ELLIS