erskine bowles 'em over
BARNES, FRED
erskine bowles 'em over by Fred Barnes Erskine Bowles, the new White House chief of staff, made only one mistake when he trekked to Capitol Hill on December 5 to woo two dozen moderate House...
...Better yet, the president is said to accept the necessity of governing through a center-right coalition...
...This is pretty cynical stuff, an attempt by Clinton to exploit the mood of bipartisanship to curb scandal hearings, which terrify the White House...
...And while former senator Bill Cohen of Maine, picked for defense secretary, is no favorite of conservatives, he is a Republican...
...Jesse Helms, who grew up with Bowles's father...
...Watch what he says...
...Bowles's pitch to Republicans "reflects where the president's head is...
...Thomas insisted it's the "Kassebaum-Kennedy" bill: The name of the majority-party sponsor, GOP senator Nancy Kassebaum of Kansas, comes first, not Teddy Kennedy's...
...Bill Thomas of California the wrong way...
...He's pro-business and bent on balancing the federal budget, Bowles insisted...
...Some White House advisers feel conservative Republicans hate Clinton and thus aren't ready to do business...
...The larger reason is he doesn't want to side openly with Republicans on the main campaign issue invoked by Democrats this fall...
...Communications director Don Baer, another moderate voice around Clinton, is staying...
...You will not see the president in the Oval Office wearing sackcloth," an aide says...
...Aside from that, everything Bowles said went over swimmingly...
...Our biggest problem will not be getting Democrats but getting conservative Republicans...
...erskine bowles 'em over by Fred Barnes Erskine Bowles, the new White House chief of staff, made only one mistake when he trekked to Capitol Hill on December 5 to woo two dozen moderate House Republicans, and it was a small one...
...Many Republicans, notably Senate Foreign Relations chairman Jesse Helms, preferred Madeleine Albright, whom Clinton named...
...Another strong moderate at the White House, Bill Curry, is returning in January to Connecticut, where he'll probably run for governor in 1998...
...Given the two top items on Clinton's agenda—balancing the budget and figuring out how to curb entitlements—that probably can't be avoided anyway...
...That rubbed Rep...
...Democrats on Capitol Hill also may prevent Clinton from moving sharply toward Republicans on Medicare, tax cuts, and other issues...
...His appeal to Republicans was "encouraging," says GOP congressman Fred Upton, who hosted the Bowles appearance...
...Still skeptical...
...There's really a good word for describing that agenda, besides New Democrat—it's Republican," a White House official confesses, without embarrassment...
...So is press secretary Mike McCurry, a closet New Democrat...
...I keep my word," Bowles said...
...Love-bombing of Republicans by the Clinton White House is not entirely a new phenomenon...
...Now, in Clinton's second term, bipartisanship has a second chance...
...But bipartisanship was not sustainable...
...The known is Bowles: He wants to...
...Watch what the president does," says an aide...
...The president is famously susceptible to pressure, and liberals are bound to exert a lot...
...My guess is liberal Democrats, docile in 1996, will be a bigger problem than Clinton and his aides acknowledge...
...It is time to put country ahead of party," he said in Little Rock on election night...
...If liberals are angry at the White House, that won't help him win the Democratic presidential nomination in 2000...
...Yes, Clinton has said the right things about compromising with Republicans, rather than using them as a foil again...
...Among Clinton's advisers, there's a known and an unknown on the question of compromising with Republicans...
...He abandoned his first choice for secretary of state, George Mitchell, at least partly because Republicans loathe him...
...For sure, the president is wary of irritating congressional Democrats by apologizing to Republicans for his exaggerated attacks on their plans for Medicare reform...
...The president makes the same case...
...With Clinton, however, words are often political tools, unrelated to his true intentions...
...If they decide to go full bore, we'll wind up with an atmosphere that's very bitter," says a Clinton aide...
...The liberal axis at the White House—chief of staff Leon Panetta, deputy Harold Ickes, and George Steph-anopoulos—is gone...
...Clinton is eager to revive the spirit of last summer, when he and Republicans agreed on a welfare bill and Kassebaum-Kennedy and added tax breaks for small business to the hike in the minimum wage...
...The biggest obstacle, from the White House viewpoint, is Republican hearings on Indogate and other Clinton scandals...
...Should Republicans go easy on investigations, he said on November 8, "the American people will be very well pleased by the work we do together, and we will get a lot done...
...He and John Hilley, the White House congressional lobbyist, referred to the "Kennedy-Kassebaum" health-care bill passed last summer...
...Clinton, for instance, doesn't want to mount an aggressive drive to defeat the balanced budget amendment...
...Watch Gore to see how far bipartisanship is likely to go at the Clinton White House, a Clinton aide suggests...
...I'm going to return your phone calls...
...For what it's worth—and I'm not holding my breath—that's bipartisanship that works chiefly off a conservative agenda...
...Congressional Republicans need to show "a somewhat less adolescent attitude," an aide says...
...The unknown is Vice President Al Gore...
...She, after all, has been pursuing, as United Nations ambassador, the GOP-instigated effort to force out secretary general Boutros Boutros-Ghali...
...The voters "are sending up a message: Work together, meet our challenges, put aside the politics of division, and build America's community together...
...One reason is Clinton doesn't think he said anything out of line about the GOP and Medicare...
...And they may yet prevail...
...Bowles, an investment banker by trade, is far more conservative than Panetta...
...Another adviser adds: "The one thing Clinton knows for sure is he's for working it out [with Republicans], not fighting it out...
...At his press conference on November 8, Clinton declared he's tried to "make it clear that we understand the American people want us to work together with the Republicans and that we have to build a vital center...
...True, Clinton wants other things—a rollback of parts of the welfare reform bill, more education spend-ing—that liberal Democrats relish...
...But Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin and Gene Sperling, the White House economics adviser, do...
...Despite the good vibes, serious impediments to a Clinton-GOP detente remain...
...Clinton governed at the mercy of congressional Democrats, and they weren't interested in dealing with Republicans...
...If they push social issues, especially another ban on partial-birth abortion, that "would not set us in the right direction," another Clinton adviser warns...
...Clinton's selection of a new foreign policy team shows some concern for Republican sensibilities...
...It's a huge test," the aide insists, of the GOP's desire for bipartisanship...
...But those are secondary, at least for now...
...Good advice for Republicans...
...It won't work...
...Things have changed [at the White House]," a senior Clinton aide notes...
...And it's not a reliable indicator of real bipartisan sentiments at the White House either...
...I'm going to be open and honest...
...The president courted Republicans in seeking NAFTA ratification in 1993 and even made a few conciliatory gestures during the health care struggle in 1994...
...Clinton's actions speak louder...
...He's an honest broker—just ask North Carolina Republicans like former congressman Alex McMillan, whose campaign Bowles backed financially, and Sen...
Vol. 2 • December 1996 • No. 14
