Easy Does It
EDITORIAL Easy Does It Trent Lott, the Senate Republican leader, believes President Bush won a mandate in the midterm election. House majority leader Dick Armey says the Republican victories give...
...And its time will come—later...
...Whoa...
...Rather than success, Clinton produced a political backlash...
...ber 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon...
...A broad mandate...
...It wasn't for Bush's father...
...And giving a veto to the economic establishment in Washington—Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, Treasury secretary Paul O'Neill, and budget director Mitch Daniels—would be a mistake...
...A sound economy would provide that assurance...
...This is a time for boldness...
...If he's right—and probably also if he's wrong— advancing all the tax reductions to January 1, 2003, can be passed without fear of a Democratic filibuster or the loss of Republican senator Lincoln Chafee's vote...
...But remember what happened to Clinton, Gingrich, and Carter with their bloated and controversial agendas...
...He won again in 1984, only to see Democrats take the Senate back in 1986...
...The elder Bush's victory in 1988 was followed by defeats in 1990 and 1992, and the GOP landslide in 1994 wound up making Clinton's reelection easy in 1996 and giving Democrats the edge in 1998...
...The president has an interest in many other issues, as do conservatives...
...If he uses the reconciliation process, all Bush needs is 50 senators to win approval...
...For Reagan, the rest of the agenda, while not unimportant, was details, to be left for senior administration officials and congressional leaders to work out...
...Simplicity is a virtue in White House (and congressional) agenda-setting...
...Reagan stressed two goals similar to Bush's...
...But he'll have to let others take care of them—and they will...
...Sure, partially privatizing Social Security would be nice...
...As for Carter, he was said by a speechwriter to believe in 50 things but no one thing, and his agenda reflected that lack of focus...
...Not quite...
...But only on those two issues, the war and the economy...
...Bush did, and it led him to emphasize homeland security and national security in the fall campaign...
...Yes, Democrats and the media will blather about increased budget deficits...
...Trying to select certain cuts to implement now and others to roll out gradually until 2011 is a fool's game that can only lead to endless argument...
...An uncomplicated program is easy to manage, easy to promote, and easy for the public to understand...
...He's demonstrated that by his leadership as commander in chief in the war on terrorism since the SeptemSimplicity is a virtue in White House agenda-setting...
...Instead, he should concentrate on the simple agenda that voters endorsed: win the war on terrorism and juice up the economy...
...The full tax cut has already been debated and passed, so it has a large, built-in constituency in the House and Senate...
...What brought Republicans success in the midterm election was a watershed event, September 11, and the president's muscular response to it...
...Okay, an occasional prodding of the Senate to confirm his judicial nominees wouldn't hurt...
...With Lott replacing Tom Daschle as Senate majority leader, reasonable compromises on a prescription drug benefit, a patient's bill of rights, and an energy bill are now possible...
...He has the ability to focus effectively—"like a laser," as Clinton might say—on whatever few issues he chooses...
...No doubt, too, queasy presidential advisers would urge Bush to bring in outside advisers like ex-Treasury secretary Bob Rubin, who'd also advise caution...
...Bush can avert such a reversal, but only by winning the war on terrorism, which includes the ouster of Saddam Hussein, and restoring a vibrant economy...
...The same is true for Bush...
...They'd no doubt balk at imposing the full tax cut and fret about growing deficits...
...Now Bush needs to focus on the economy as well...
...They should move ahead on these...
...Even former vice president Walter Mon-dale, who lost the Minnesota Senate race, says the election was "a sweep" for Bush...
...An old saying in politics is you should "dance with the one who brung you...
...Spurred by the president, voters gave Republicans control of the Senate, a half-dozen more House seats, some state legislatures, and a wash in governor's races...
...A bill providing terrorism insurance is also crucial...
...Let's sober up about what Bush actually won on November 5 and what he should do about it...
...Bush's presidency will be defined by success or failure in winning the war on terrorism and removing the threat posed by Saddam Hussein...
...But the war—against al Qaeda and Iraq—is most crucial of all...
...Gingrich was driven out of office...
...There are many steps Bush could take to boost the economy...
...What Republicans need is exactly what they were denied over the past two decades: a string of consecutive election triumphs that create an era of conservative governance in Washington...
...Bush could suffer a similar fate in 2004 if he tries to ram a vast conservative agenda through a narrowly Republican Congress...
...This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to really force change...
...But victory in the war alone may not be enough to assure his reelection in 2004...
...An uncomplicated program is easy to manage, easy to promote, and easy for the public to understand...
...They wildly overreached, and soon shipwrecked...
...He's won agreement, finally, on a Department of Homeland Security...
...He will claim a mandate, and I think the public will accept that...
...Fred Barnes, for the Editors...
...And progress in the war and on the economy will lay the foundation for an era of Republican and conservative rule in Washington...
...Democrats never understood the terrorist attacks had permanently altered the political landscape...
...That constitutes a sweet victory but hardly a mandate for Bush to clean out the backlog of Republican legislation and dormant conservative proposals...
...Sweeping free-market reform, long sought by conservatives, is "within our reach," he told reporters...
...Democratic senator Zell Miller of Georgia says the time is ripe for Democrats to adopt tax-cutting as party policy...
...Reagan knew this, and Bush probably does too...
...The only major achievement to come out of the 1990s was welfare reform...
...Economist Kevin Hassett of the American Enterprise Institute declares, "It's morning again in America...
...But weighed against critical spending for the war on terrorism and tax cuts to spur the economy, deficits are economically and politically harmless...
...But the simplest would be to make the 10-year tax cut enacted in 2001 both permanent and immediate...
...Reagan won in 1980, but suffered a setback two years later...
...He lost the presidency in 1980...
...House majority leader Dick Armey says the Republican victories give Bush a realistic chance to reform the Social Security system in 2003...
...GOP senators are eager to confirm more conservative judges, pass a scaled-back faith-based initiative, and approve anti-cloning legislation and a new version of a ban on partial-birth abortion...
...Now, aside from concentrating on the war itself, he must complete the anti-terrorism agenda...
...We know this from the successful presidency of Ronald Reagan and the failures of Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich, and Jimmy Carter...
...One was to defeat communism and win the Cold War, the other to revive a stagnant economy...
Vol. 8 • November 2002 • No. 11
