HALLIBURTON: HALFWAY HOME? Dick Cheney's old company may be settling asbestos claims--as it wrestles with a business slump

Halliburton Co. has long been the kind of place where powerful people hung their hats, sometimes using their influence to help the oil-services giant in its quest for lucrative contracts. Lately all that political juice seemed to be of little help, however. Nasty headlines and angry shareholder suits thrust Halliburton into the controversy over corporate bookkeeping, as former Halliburton execs alleged that the Houston company cooked its books while Cheney was boss. The company says it did nothing wrong, but the allegations led to a Securities & Exchange Commission inquiry. Then there was a far more costly problem: an estimated 328,000 pending claims from workers exposed to asbestos. Amid the gloom, Halliburton needed some good news--and now it appears tantalizingly close to getting it. As of Dec. 11, Halliburton was considering an offer from plaintiffs' lawyers that would have it pay $4.2 billion to settle all outstanding asbestos claims and shield it from any future suits, according to Dallas attorney Peter Kraus, who represents plaintiffs who have sued Halliburton.