Inside Report (5)

One of New York's top Democrats finally has endorsed the other -- soft of. Gov. Hugh Carey's belated backing of Mayor Edward Koch, almost a week afterm the now-postponed New York City primary elections were to take place, wasn't really vital to the mayor's campaign. Most close observers still say Koch will get both the Republican and Democratic nominations. But it could thaw the icy cold shoulders both men have been giving each other for the past year as they have scrambled to share a smaller federal aide pie.

Carey's endorsement came in a telegram declining to attend a $400-a-plate Koch fund-raiser. Koch aides, it seems, didn't know the ambiguously worded message constituted an endorsement until Carey aides started circulating it as such.m