"Give me unions of give
Posted on 09/27/2002 6:07:05 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
Anyone watching the television news Wednesday might have gotten the impression that U.S. Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle was angry, darned angry, that President Bush earlier in the week criticized Senate Democrats for not being concerned about the nation's security.
The statement to which the good senator took exception came in a campaign swing through New Jersey on behalf of GOP candidates, in which the president said, "The House responded, but the Senate is more interested in special interests in Washington and not interested in the security of the American people. I will not accept a Department of Homeland Security that does not allow this president and future presidents to better keep the American people secure."
Sen. Daschle took to the Senate floor in response. "That is outrageous," he thundered. "We ought not politicize the rhetoric about war and life and death."
The first question must therefore be: What was it about the Sept. 23 presidential statement that supposedly got the majority leader's goat, when he appeared blithely untroubled by the president's Sept. 5 pronouncement in Louisville that, "I am not going to accept a bill where the Senate micromanages, where the Senate shows they're more interested in special interest in Washington and not interested in the security of the American people" ... and again on Sept. 7 when the president reiterated that in his national radio address?
The president has been using almost precisely the same phrasing for three weeks. Has Sen. Daschle been on a long fishing trip?
In fact, Senate Democrats favor changes to the Homeland Security Department bill that would reduce the president's existing ability to exempt workers from union agreements -- and thus limit his ability to freely hire, fire and reassign. The changes are favored by the public employees unions and their bosses, the "special interests" to which the White House refers.
This increases the possibility that legislation cobbling together the giant new anti-terrorism agency out of 22 existing federal entities might not pass Congress this year, thanks to the influence of labor unions over the Democratic Party. That creates an election-year issue for the GOP, and Sen. Daschle can't have that.
In fact, though, unless the Senate Democrats relent, the majority leader can huff and puff all he wants and it won't change the fact that feeding a traditional Democratic special interest is more important to Sen. Daschle and his cohorts than creating a department of homeland security.
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