POLITICAL BRIEFING

UNDER FIRE--Two Senate incumbents find themselves under serious assault within their own parties as their home state primaries approach. . . . In Illinois, two-term Democrat Alan J. Dixon faces a well-financed challenge from wealthy attorney Albert Hofeld, who, in a barrage of television advertising--much of it bankrolled by himself--is calling on voters to “shake up� Congress. But Hofeld’s hopes may be dashed by a second Dixon foe, Carol Moseley Braun, a Cook County official who is black. Although underfinanced, she could draw enough support to undercut the anti-Dixon vote in the March 17 primary. . . . In Pennsylvania, two-term Republican Arlen Specter is being taken on by conservative state legislator Steven Freind, the man behind that state’s restrictive abortion law. Specter’s generally liberal record long has angered GOP conservatives, but even they admired his defense of Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas in last fall’s Judiciary Committee hearings. His foes, one analyst said, “felt defanged� by Specter’s performance.