Still, polls have shown that most Americans, particularly those in the liberal Northeast, seem prepared to let the President off with a wrist slap.

Similar guidelines could help ensure that punitive damages are high enough to deter bad conduct; $250,000 would hardly amount to a wrist slap.

"We got a little more than a wrist slap," said Syracuse Coach Jim Boeheim.

The settlement was regarded as little more than a wrist slap for Microsoft, and it is now being challenged in Federal court.

But justice will truly be trampled if they get a wrist slap for aiding the killer of Dr. Barnett A. Slepian.

Got her off with a wrist slap," he said with a self-deprecating shrug.

Blacky marketers are given a wrist slap in most instances.

There was a stern, reproving silence after my exu- berant claim, a kind of logic-to-nonsense wrist slap- ping, but he didn't make any direct commentsu "Yes.

But neither Judge Sporkin nor any other outsider has the foggiest idea whether the agreement is adequate or a mere wrist slap when stronger measures are needed.

She'd been so sure he'd escape or at worst get a wrist slap.