Kautzman's AP GO PO Blog

David Broder
Washington Post
October 7, 2007

The day had been full of ominous warnings. Polls showed the Republicans on the losing side of almost every issue and the 2008 presidential race – and now they’re forced to defend a veto of a popular children’s health bill.

But Tom Cole, the 58-year-old Oklahoma representative who this year took on the responsibility for running the GOP’s congressional campaign, is remarkably sanguine.

He had been reading about the Washington Post/ABC News poll showing that Hillary Rodham Clinton had established a commanding lead for the Democratic presidential nomination and was beating Rudy Giuliani, the current Republican front-runner, by 51 percent to 43 percent.

The same poll showed President Bush’s approval rating at 33 percent, equaling his historic low, and congressional Republicans at 29 percent, the lowest ever recorded for them. Democrats are trusted more than Republicans when it comes to handling Iraq, health care, the economy and the federal budget, the poll said, and the two parties are tied on terrorism – supposedly the Republicans’ strong suit.

So how could he be reasonably satisfied with his party’s prospects? The answer: The Democrats are also looking like dogs.

The approval score for their party in Congress has sunk to 38 percent – down 10 points since a poll taken just before the 2006 election that gave the Democrats their first congressional majority since 1994.

Congress as a whole rated only 29 percent approval, down 14 points from its start in January. By 82 percent to 16 percent, those polled said it has accomplished little or nothing this year. Half blame Bush and the Republicans; a quarter, the Democrats; and another fifth, both parties.

Cole, who admits Republicans hurt themselves in 2006 with scandals and out-of-control spending, said the poll confirms a comment from a Republican colleague. Speaking of the Democrats, he said, “My God, they’re dragging themselves down to our level.”

It all adds up, Cole said, to a political environment reminiscent of 1992 – a tough year for entrenched incumbents of both parties who suddenly saw their margins shrink or disappear. “The American people are rising up in disgust,” Cole said, “and incumbents will pay. It’s not anti-Republican anymore. It’s anti-Washington.”

Cole argues that the House Democratic leadership has made a strategic error by wielding its narrow majority to craft partisan bills that invite a Bush veto. That was the case with several resolutions to shorten the Iraq war, and it will be the case later with a series of appropriations bills. Polarization is exactly what the voters hate, Cole said; they are looking for cooperation and agreement.

But the crucial question at the moment, politically, is Bush’s veto of the SCHIP bill – the $35 billion expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. The Post poll found 72 percent approval for this measure, which would add 4 million children to the ranks of the insured.

Cole claims that Republicans will be protected by asserting that they favor the concept and are prepared to support a less expensive compromise.

I’m more persuaded by his argument that Republicans have little to fear from a Hillary Clinton candidacy. “That is no landslide election,” he said. “The Republican nominee, whoever he is, wins at least 43-44-45 percent against her, and that gives us a base for congressional races.”

Cole has history on his side. In 1992, he notes, incumbents were hammered, 24 of them losing in November, another 17 failing in their primaries. The Republicans achieved a net gain of 10 House seats that year, a feather in the cap of the executive director of the National Republican Congressional Committee, Tom Cole.

In 1992, the Democrats nominated Bill Clinton for president – and he won. But his party lost House seats. Cole is out to make history repeat itself.

Ellen Nakashima
Washington Post
October 7, 2007

WASHINGTON – House Democrats plan to introduce a bill this week that would let a secret court issue one-year “umbrella” warrants to allow the government to intercept e-mails and phone calls of foreign targets and would not require that surveillance of each person be approved individually.

The bill is likely to resurrect controversy that erupted this summer when Congress, under White House pressure, rushed through a temporary emergency law that expanded the government’s authority to conduct foreign surveillance on U.S. soil without a warrant. The Protect America Act, which expires in February, has been criticized as being too broad and lacking effective court oversight.

The Democrats’ legislation, drafted by the Intelligence and Judiciary committee chairmen, is aimed to reconcile civil liberties, privacy and national security concerns. It would overhaul the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, a 1978 law amended many times that the Bush administration argues has been outstripped by technology.

“Some conservatives want no judicial oversight, and some liberals oppose any notion of a blanket order,” said James Dempsey, Center for Democracy and Technology policy director. “So the challenge of the Democratic leadership is to strike a balance, one that gives the National Security Agency the flexibility to select its targets overseas but that keeps the court involved to protect the private communications of innocent Americans.”

The bill would require the Justice Department inspector general to audit the use of the umbrella warrant and issue quarterly reports to a special FISA court and to Congress, according to congressional aides involved in drafting the legislation.

President says he’s ‘willing to work with’ Congress

Hoyer

Judy Pasternak
Los Angeles Times
October 7, 2007

WASHINGTON – President Bush indicated Saturday that he would be willing to accept a larger increase for a children’s health insurance program than the one he has proposed but defended his veto of the expansion of coverage approved by Congress.

Bush’s veto Wednesday set off an ideological battle about who holds responsibility for extending health care benefits to uninsured children: the government or the private sector.

The congressional bill would spend $60 billion over five years to expand health coverage for children of the working poor and middle-class, and it would pay for it with higher tobacco taxes. Bush has offered $30 billion, a 20 percent increase over current levels but not enough to maintain the existing enrollment in what is known as the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, budget analysts say.

The program is managed by states within federal guidelines and serves about 6 million children. An estimated 9 million children remain uninsured in the U.S. The number has been rising as employers cut back coverage.

Bush’s veto led one Democratic lawmaker last week to call the president “Ebenezer Scrooge,” while a Republican pollster noted that “it will take some superb communications to persuade voters that the White House really is on the side of children’s health.”

During his weekly radio address Saturday, Bush called for a compromise but offered no specifics.

“If putting poor children first takes a little more than the 20 percent increase I have proposed in my budget for SCHIP, I am willing to work with leaders in Congress to find the additional money,” he said.

Bush earlier hinted he was open to a compromise but still has not made clear what he is willing to accept. He continued to describe the measure that he vetoed as “deeply flawed,” contending that the plan was “an incremental step toward their goal of government-run health care for every American ,” which he believes is “the wrong direction for our country.”

Rep. Steny Hoyer, a Maryland Democrat who is the House majority leader, pointed out that most children enrolled in SCHIP receive coverage through private insurers who hold state contracts, even though the government subsidizes the benefits.

“The truth is, America’s largest private insurance lobbying group supports this bill – as do America’s doctors, nurses, children’s advocates and, most importantly 72 percent of Americans,” Hoyer said in the Democrats’ response to Bush’s address.

The current law, which remains in effect while the debate over reauthorizing it continues, covers children in families earning up to $40,000 a year, about twice the federal poverty level. But some states obtained permission to extend eligibility to families with higher incomes, and the bill would authorize states to allow households with an income of about $60,000 a year to enroll their children in SCHIP.