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CNN Saturday Morning News

How Has Bush Done in His First Six Months?

Aired August 04, 2001 - 08:20   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BRIAN NELSON, CNN ANCHOR: In case you didn't know, President Bush is in the hospital right now. He is getting a medical checkup, a six-hour medical checkup before he gets back on the plane and heads out to Crawford, Texas for his annual vacation, which will last a month.

But the president yesterday went out to the Rose Garden to crow a bit about his first six months in office and he said a clear agenda has resulted in progress on taxes, on energy, education and patients' rights.

So, Richard Cohen of the "National Journal" joins us now from Washington with his perspective on the Bush administration's record so far. Mr. Cohen, thanks for being with us this morning.

RICHARD COHEN, "NATIONAL JOURNAL": Nice to be with you.

NELSON: Has the president got something to crow about?

COHEN: I think it's, all things considered it's been a pretty good six months and certainly the past week was a very good week for the president and Republicans in Congress. Just very briefly to summarize the startup, back this spring where we called it, he did pass, he got most of the tax cut that he wanted. That's been enacted. The checks are in the mail, as the White House says. And now they're finishing up the education bill that he wanted.

So that was kind of the first step. And this past week the president had, can crow about significant victories in the House of Representatives on both the energy bill and the patients bill of rights.

NELSON: Let me just ask you about those tax rebates for just a moment. There's word coming out now, I mean it's becoming a little more apparent this week that those really aren't rebates for taxes paid last year. They're pretty much just a down payment on the taxes we will pay next April. And so I'm wondering is the president going to be able to really claim this as a credit?

COHEN: Well, I think what the main purpose of the White House, I think they're less interested in what happens when we all fill out our 1040 forms next spring. I think what they're -- their hope is that people will feel better taxpayers, consumers, especially, will feel better about the economy and will be spending money and then give a little charge to the economy right now.

And frankly I -- and the other purpose, a more political purpose is Republicans and the Bush White House want to get the word out that they've taken some of the federal surplus and given it over to the taxpayers.

NELSON: Yes. But they've had to finance that through Treasury bond sales.

COHEN: That's right.

NELSON: Which means that there isn't enough money in the kitty to even finance the rebates.

COHEN: And that, in turn, has led Democrats to say that this money is coming out of the Medicare Trust Fund, which is a complex set of budget issues and debates that frankly few of us understand.

NELSON: So is this dispute likely to grow and turn into something thorny for the president or just barely?

COHEN: Absolutely. Absolutely.

NELSON: Yes?

COHEN: I think the big issue in the fall is going to be the budget and the dwindling surplus which you refer to.

NELSON: Yes. Let's take a look now at the patients bill of rights that was passed by the House. It's heading to the Senate. Is that going to survive in any form the president wants?

COHEN: Well, I mean we now, we've got a Senate passed bill. We have a House passed bill. And what happens in this kind of case is there's a conference committee. There will be a conference committee. There's, there are a lot of similarities between the two versions, but the difference is particularly relating to legal liability and how individuals can sue their HMO or sue their insurance company. These will take time and efforts to resolve and they will take a good will, good will by both sides to reach an agreement.

I mean I, I mean a lot of this is technical legislative lawyers language that both sides need to come together on. I think that technically they can do it. It's a question of whether there is a political will to resolve the differences and get a bill enacted. And we don't know that yet.

NELSON: And there was some progress made on the president's energy proposal, too. Where does that sit?

COHEN: Well, it was, frankly, surprising to many people here, including a lot of folks in the press corps, that the president got approval for drilling in ANWR up in Alaska, the 2,000 acres along the north, the northern part of Alaska. And now...

NELSON: Are we likely to see drilling? COHEN: It's actually on land near the Bering Sea or way up north there.

NELSON: Yes, but what I was getting at, are we likely to actually see drilling start?

COHEN: It's going to be a real fight in the Senate and a lot of, a number of liberal Senate Democrats, John Kerry from Massachusetts, Joe Lieberman from Connecticut, have vowed that they will filibuster the bill.

But I think there will be pressure, clearly, on the Senate to produce some kind of energy legislation and even if the Senate does not pass, does not give any authority for drilling in ANWR, that bill also will have to go to a conference committee and it's possible that a deal will be cut giving the president some of what he wants on ANWR, on this Alaskan oil, and on some of the energy initiatives that he's proposed.

So it's going to be a tough fight and it will play out through much of the fall and the president is in better shape now than he was a week ago on this issue.

NELSON: OK, very quickly, the last issue is campaign finance reform. That did not make it through this session, but they are collecting signatures now to try and bring that back in the fall. What are the chances that we are going to see something on campaign finance reform this fall?

COHEN: Well, actually, it got overshadowed this week of everything else going on. But the chances as a result of events this week are better that there will be, the bill will return to the House floor.

Very briefly, what happened is that there are now 205 signatures of House members demanding that the bill return to the House floor this fall and that's just almost at the 218 signatures that are required. There's a good chance that this will now force Speaker Dennis Hastert to schedule the bill on the House floor.

But that in turn still leaves open the question of whether and what the House is willing to approve and I think there's a big question mark that the House is willing, whether the House is willing to go nearly as far as the campaign finance reformers want to go.

NELSON: OK, thanks for taking a look at the score card for us in Washington this morning.

Richard Cohen from the "National Journal," thanks for being with us.

COHEN: Thank you.

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