01-06-2001

POLITICS: Reminders From the Right

On Dec. 20, Karl Rove, the chief campaign strategist for George W. Bush
and soon-to-be presidential counselor, was the headliner at the regular
Wednesday meeting of conservative Republican activists in Washington. For
90
minutes, he spoke in a crowded conference room about Bush's efforts to
assemble a Cabinet, advised everyone how to funnel information and
personnel
suggestions to the transition team, and assured the gathering that the
President-elect remained committed to the campaign agenda he laid out
before
the election results bisected everything. The chat was intended to
reassure
the group that conservatives matter to Bush and to establish Rove as their
go-
to guy in the White House. But it also transmitted a message about where
Bush
saw the new Republican power base: inside the Oval Office.


Before the election, Bush was a uniter within his own party, offering
various GOP factions the promise of a conservative agenda with a
moderate's
winning presentation. Conservatives tolerated Bush's centrist, bipartisan
rhetoric and his "compassionate" symbols as they headed toward
the
winner's circle. But the tantalizing thought of GOP control of the House,
Senate, and White House for the first time since the Eisenhower era sent
chills through some who feared that Bush might compromise away the
promised
agenda before he even started.


Education (vouchers). Tax cuts (a big, 10-year package, including lower
marginal rates). The military (spending hikes, plus a missile defense
system).
Social Security reform (private accounts in the financial markets).
Medicare
(reform, plus an immediate prescription drug benefit). These are the key
promises that Bush ran on, and he insists he will be able to deliver on
them
eventually.


Will Bush govern as a moderate, a conservative, or both? The answer
remains to be seen, but speculation already abounds. William Kristol, who
served in the first Bush White House and is editor of The Weekly Standard,
suggested on the The Diane Rehm Show recently that Bush would sound like a
moderate and "sometimes" govern like one. Because of
Washington's
newest partisan divisions and the Republicans' slimmer majorities, the
conventional wisdom says that Bush will have to lead and legislate from
the
middle-where the American people reside politically.


"The fact is, with the state of this environment-with Congress
having these razor-close margins-there needs to be some conciliation, and
there need to be some Democrats involved in the process if you're going to
move forward and get things done," said Scott Reed, who managed Bob
Dole's 1996 presidential campaign.


"George W. Bush has a strong pro-life record as a governor; he took
pro-life positions during the campaign, and we're confident that those
will be
the policies of his Administration," said Douglas Johnson,
legislative
director of the National Right to Life Committee. "He's a man of
integrity, and we believe he has articulated his true values and beliefs.
That
doesn't mean the President will achieve everything he has
promised."


Inside the Far Right of the GOP ranks, there are lingering worries that
Bush, like his father, will tend to be less ideological and more
pragmatic.
Asked whether George W. Bush is a true conservative, Gary Bauer, president
of
American Values and a Bush rival last year for the Republican nomination,
hesitated. "I don't know enough yet in the things I've watched in
Texas
and the debates I've had with him. I don't think he'd describe himself as
a
movement conservative. I think he's a Bush Republican, and that's a little
different than a Reagan Republican."


In Washington's new political environment, especially following the loss
of a handful of conservatives in a Senate now split 50-50, the firebrands
worry that the President will veer from the right toward the murkier
middle. A
host of GOP think tanks and conservative groups have been assembling
suggestions for the Bush White House on everything from acceptable Cabinet
picks and new executive orders, to the continued pursuit of Clinton-Gore
evidentiary documents and e-mails.


Days before Nov. 7, Grover Norquist, the president of Americans for Tax
Reform, said in an interview that GOP groups were assembling lists of
every
Bush promise made along the campaign trail, with the intention of
presenting
to the President-elect their ideas about "how we want to work with
you." If Bush believes that he can sweep aside the promises he made
when
he needed conservatives' support to get elected, Norquist said before
anyone
knew Bush was the victor, "he has a little ghost of [former Budget
Director] Dick Darman sitting on his shoulder, saying, `I destroyed your
father's presidency. Remember me? Your father listened to me and only
served
one term.' And then there's a little angel on the other side,"
Norquist
continued, "saying, `Keep your promises.' "


Keep your promises. But which ones? In what order? And what is the
political price of postponement? Already the strategy debates are in full
throat: Start sweet and stack up some unifying wins. Or go for broke, and
if
you lose, lay claim to valor and blame the Democrats for obstruction.
Since Al
Gore's concession and Bush's ascension, Norquist has sounded more and more
confident about the incoming White House team. "They are keeping all
parts of the coalition loved and appreciated," he said in an
interview.
"We'll see how it goes."


What he, along with House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., suggests is
that Bush rack up some early victories with pieces of the GOP tax agenda
for
which there previously was Democratic support, and add separate measures,
including some kind of cut in marginal rates, later. Examples would
include
relief from the tax penalty on married couples and the elimination of the
estate tax. "There would be a series of victories," Norquist
said.
"There would be 10 headlines, not one." For proponents of tax
relief, the size of the tax cut-almost half a trillion dollars over five
years
and $1.3 trillion over 10 years-is not negotiable. "It's the shape of
the
tax cut that's negotiable," Norquist said.


Conservative groups need to be realistic about their priorities and
Bush's need to get the lay of the land, he suggested. "You say, `Here
are
the three things we want.' Asking for more than that is being
stupid,"
Norquist said. "You don't tell the President, `We have to have these
17
things.' You have to identify what's important to you, and to the
Administration."


Cato Institute economist Stephen Moore hails from the go-for-broke
school of fiscal thinking. Those in Congress who are advising the Bush
team to
take the incremental tax-relief approach are "weak-kneed," he
said.
"It is strategically harmful. They are compromising with
themselves....
If you divide up the tax bill into little pieces, a lot of it will be left
on
the cutting board," Moore predicted. "If anything, Bush's tax
cut is
too small, not too big.... Wrap it together and Bush has to stake his
whole
political reputation on this."


Bauer, too, has been publicly advising his former opponent to be bold,
particularly on the social conservatives' agenda. "By taking the
advice
to do little and accomplish it slowly, he would find himself leading no
one,
building nothing, and disappointing his best friends," Bauer wrote in
a
Dec. 15 New York Times op-ed column. "It is a path destined to end in
four years."


To Bauer's way of thinking, the Bush team should want to sign a
"partial-birth" abortion ban-which has bipartisan support but
was
vetoed by President Clinton-"as quickly as possible. Any indication
that
they would rather not have that land on his desk would be
disturbing."


Johnson of the National Right to Life Committee refused to speculate
about a timetable for the partial-birth abortion ban, noting that a lot
depends on how the committee leadership of the House and Senate shakes out
and
how various bills relate to one another as they move through Congress
early
this year.


"Bush is committed to the pro-life agenda," said Bush campaign
adviser Ralph Reed, president of Atlanta-based Century Strategies and
former
executive director of the Christian Coalition, in an interview. "But
not
all of that agenda is achievable in the short term."


Republicans of all stripes should give the President-elect some
breathing room "and not close any doors for him," suggested
Scott
Reed, a former executive director of the Republican National Committee.
"This is a dangerous time for both parties," he added.
"Everyone is on [his] best behavior right now. He who goes first has
the
potential to get slapped hard."


For strategic reasons, some conservatives suggest that Bush's budget
should move through Congress first, and that legislation on partial-birth
abortion might best be taken up later in the year, perhaps in the summer,
before lawmakers exit for the August recess.


The public warnings by Bauer and the Rev. Jerry Falwell of Bush's need
to keep his campaign promises have raised a few eyebrows within the
conservative coalition. Bauer, because of his status as an unsuccessful
Bush
challenger, comes in for particular criticism. "Whining" takes
the
place of clout, some critics suggest. "I'm not whining about
anything," Bauer said. "I'm just trying to give the best advice
I
can for the cause.... Everyone can pursue their own
approach."


One approach designed to juice up Bush's agenda and help Republicans
facing the 2002 midterm elections is a broad-based communications, public
relations, and advertising effort financed by private interests, said
Scott
Reed, one of three architects of the newly created Issues Management
Group.
The other two are Greg Mueller, a former adviser to Steve Forbes and Pat
Buchanan, and Bill Dal Col, the manager of Forbes' 1996 and 2000
presidential
races. Scott Reed said that the IMC hopes to raise between $5 million and
$10
million in 2001 to hire talented professionals who can help build public
support for Bush's policies through op-ed articles and broadcast and print
interviews of surrogate spokespeople. He also said that the IMC hopes to
devote more than three-quarters of its budget to a television and radio
advertising campaign that would begin airing in the spring. "It's
important for Republicans to get on the offense with issues and with
Bush's
agenda," he said.


The effort is entirely uncoordinated with Bush's White House team, he
added, but is intended to be complementary to the new President's agenda,
especially on the five significant issues on which Bush campaigned:
education
reform; privatizing Social Security; cutting taxes; improving military
readiness and missile defense; and reforming Medicare and adding
prescription
drug coverage. "There are sectors around town that care about each of
these issues," Scott Reed said. "Each will be involved. This was
a
substantive campaign about real issues, and corporate America followed it
closely."


The Republican Right has been delighted with several Cabinet picks by
Bush and Vice President-elect Dick Cheney (viewed as a true-blue
conservative), including: former Sen. John Ashcroft of Missouri as
Attorney
General; Wisconsin Gov. Tommy G. Thompson, an abortion opponent, for
Health
and Human Services Secretary; Gale Norton for Interior; Linda Chavez for
Labor; and Spencer Abraham for Energy. While most conservatives would have
much preferred to see a certified supply-sider as Treasury Secretary, the
reaction to the selection of Alcoa executive Paul O'Neill has been polite.
Tax
cutters are waiting to see how Bush's White House economic apparatus takes
shape; campaign economic adviser Larry Lindsey, considered one of their
own,
is to become head of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. And
economist John Cogan of California's Hoover Institution is drafting Bush's
first budget presentation to Congress.


Making good on policy promises to conservatives will cut along two
challenging fault lines-fiscal policy and social issues. "Given the
family history, [Bush] cannot fail to deliver a tax cut," Bauer said.
Compromise with Democrats will be required, but "as long as you cover
the
broad middle class, it would still be applauded."


On trade, nothing seems certain, although Bush will want fast-track
trade-negotiating authority that can sidestep some congressional approval.
"Not only are Republicans deeply divided, but conservatives are
deeply
divided," Bauer noted. "If he seeks more trade with places like
China, for instance, or delinks human rights from trade policy, he'll
satisfy
corporate donors, and he'll anger people like me. If I had to guess,
that's
not going to be a hard call," Bauer said, chuckling. "This is
going
to be one of the great debates of the Bush Administration."


Interest groups of the social conservative stripe want to reverse any
Clinton-era executive orders or directives not already addressed in the
past
eight years by Congress. (Some are suggesting an immediate purging of all
Clinton orders, while others think that Bush should put a 30- or 60-day
expiration date on all of them while the White House conducts a thorough
review and puts its own stamp on policy.) Conservatives also seek the
appointment of like-minded officials at the Food and Drug Administration,
as
U.S. surgeon general, and within the National Institutes of Health, where
controversial cell research is supported. At Justice, they would like to
see
Bush's opposition to affirmative action carried out within the Civil
Rights
Division. And they will insist that federal judges and Supreme Court
nominees
comport with conservative thinking about the hazards of legislating from
the
bench.


The intraparty pressures confronting Bush, including the pressure to
keep promises made in the heat of the campaign, are similar to what all
other
modern Presidents-elect have faced, according to Jeff Fishel, an emeritus
professor of government at American University and the author of the 1985
book
Presidents and Promises: From Campaign Pledge to Presidential Performance.
"I don't think Republicans and Democrats differ a lot in terms of
presidential coalitions and being able to reach out and appeal to core
constituencies and reach a broader national consensus on what they're
doing," Fishel said in an interview. "In Bush's case, there are
a
lot of people who put a lot of time into the election and believe they
need to
be rewarded."


What is so challenging for Bush, Fishel suggested, is the context of his
promises to conservatives. "He comes in as a minority President, and
with
such enormous constraints ... that his ability to deliver is going to be
questionable." In addition, Bush campaigned as a coalition builder-a
politician who believes in bipartisanship and achieving results.
"He's
clearly giving out the message that he's a guy willing to
compromise,"
Fishel said, "and that makes it harder to deliver on specific
promises."


Fishel's research into the promises and achievements of presidential
Administrations from John F. Kennedy to Ronald Reagan shows that pressures
to
deliver to a President's own party coalition are most intense in the first
two
years. "In the first year, what I call the core supportive group for
a
presidential coalition makes the most demands," he said.
"Presidents, all of them, although Kennedy was a bit of an exception,
are
most likely to try to be responsive to their constituencies in the first
year."


Fishel discovered a few other truisms: Seventy percent of candidates'
campaign promises are rhetorical, carrying only generalized meaning. And
the
Presidents widely viewed as successful in office all attempted to fulfill
two-
thirds of the specific policy promises they made to voters.
"Presidents
on the whole do try most of the time to redeem what they promise,"
the
professor said. Why? "There is an incentive to follow through that is
a
reflection of their own core pressure system."


In addition, one of the best incentives for follow-through is
unequivocal victory, Fishel added, which is something Bush did not achieve
against Gore. The Kennedy White House, in a similar fix after the tight
1960
race against Richard Nixon, overcame some of that weakness by showing a
"tremendous political sophistication about what they faced, with a
willingness to be frank about it and take it on." To the academic
eye,
Fishel added, Bush's "instincts are conservative on policy, while his
instincts politically are more expansive and centrist than Reagan."
Bush's reward for satisfying his conservative base early on could be a go-
ahead to flex those centrist political instincts without serious
recriminations. And the punishment for betrayal? Perhaps a fate similar to
that other George Bush's: a one-term presidential career.


Alexis Simendinger

National Journal