Reid on the issues

Sunday, Oct. 25, 1998 | 9:23 a.m.

Senator Harry Reid:

* Taxes -- Reid, who sponsored Taxpayers' Bill of Rights laws in 1988 and 1996, would replace the current federal income tax with a national sales tax of less than 10 percent.

"My concern about the Internal Revenue Service is it rewards people who are lazy and punishes people who work hard, and it doesn't do anything positive for people who save money," Reid said. "A consumer-based tax would reward people who save. You would only pay taxes when you bought something.

"The problem with a flat tax is a flat tax is still an income tax. It can be changed on a yearly basis."

* Regulations -- The senator has introduced legislation that would require all federal regulations to be reviewed every 10 years or become nullified.

"The government too easily promulgates regulations that have a disastrous impact on individuals and small businesses," Reid said. "We need to have a way of reviewing what government has done. We have antiquated laws that authorize things.

"The Tea Tasting Board was in effect for over 100 years. I worked very hard to get rid of that. If the Tea Tasting Board had to be reauthorized every 10 years, it would have been gone 50 or 60 years ago."

* Crime -- Arguing that there is a correlation between juvenile crime and school dropouts, Reid has introduced a bill that would establish a "dropout" czar within the U.S. Department of Education. The czar would be responsible for programs to keep children in school.

"We have 3,000 (nationwide) kids drop out of school every day," Reid said. "That adds to our cost for a juvenile justice system. Anything we can do to keep kids in school reduces crime."

The senator also would give prosecutors more leeway to go after gang members involved in illegal interstate commerce.

"What has happened in the past is we have limited the prosecution to gang leaders," he said. "But we spend most of our time trying to figure out who the gang leader was and if that would stand up in court."

Reid also believes the appeals process in criminal cases must be accelerated.

"If a decision is made by a jury and a judge, it should be carried out as quickly as possible, and it is not happening now," he said.

* Growth -- Reid vowed to use his position as a member of both the Senate Appropriations, and Environment and Public Works committees to push for more money for Southern Nevada highway, airport, flood control and mass transit projects.

He also hopes that local officials apply for a portion of the more than $1 billion that was included in this year's federal highway bill for the development of magnetic levitation travel. Reid would like to see a high-speed system using that technology connecting Las Vegas with Southern California.

One of his top priorities, however, is to secure more funding for the widening of Interstate 15 between Las Vegas and Victorville, Calif.

"It's just an old road that needs to be modernized," he said.

* Education -- The senator, who has stressed his support for public education and its teachers, would like to see federal money used to help build and renovate schools. An effort by Democrats to include money to help pay the interest on school construction loans failed to make it into the 1999 federal budget agreement. Reid said about $60 million would have gone to Clark County schools.

"All over America we need help in school construction and school renovation," Reid said. "Here in Southern Nevada it's a very serious problem. The superintendent of schools (Brian Cram) told me he is not a school superintendent, he's a construction superintendent."

Reid, a supporter of class size reduction, would like to see the student-teacher ratio lowered to 18 to one for first through sixth grade. That would be accomplished, he said, by hiring more teachers.

He also favors allowing all colleges and universities to make direct loans to students, cutting out the banks that collect additional interest.

"It saves money for the students, and it saves money for the country," Reid said. "I'm also a great believer in Pell grants and Hope scholarships. All these programs make it easier for kids to go to school. A child's ability to be educated should not be dependent on how much money the parents have."

* Environment -- Reid, who has sponsored national park and wilderness legislation for Nevada, supports existing clean water and air laws. But he would like to see the Superfund law reworked so that more money is spent on cleanup of polluted sites and less on attorneys.

The senator also believes that the Endangered Species Act needs to be revised to enable increased involvement from state and local government.

"What we need to do is make it so that once something is listed (as endangered) that there's a process to delist," Reid said. "You may want to have an endangered species and move it down to a threatened species because it means less control. It would cost less money to do that."

Reid also wants to increase funding for food inspections. In Nevada, the senator vowed to remain active in the preservation of lakes and rivers. Having secured funds for the study of possible contaminants in the Las Vegas Wash, which drains into Lake Mead, Reid said he has placed a high priority on making sure that Southern Nevada has safe drinking water.

"We want to make sure the people of Southern Nevada feel good about the water they turn their tap on and drink," he said. "I've also worked on desalinization programs that are important not only for oceans but for the brackish water we find in our groundwater."

* Seniors -- Noting that seniors are living "longer, more productive lives," Reid wants them to be able to draw Social Security no matter how much they earn from other sources.

"Right now they have a maximum that they can earn and if they earn over that, they can't draw Social Security benefits," Reid said. "I think that's wrong. It would be a more productive society if they could work as long as they wanted to."

Reid also wants to remove the inequity that forces so-called "notch babies" born between 1917 and 1921 to receive less in Social Security benefits than anyone else. One measure he supports is to give each of these individuals a lump sum of $5,000.

The senator has proposed rewarding medical schools that require courses in geriatrics.

"One of the concerns I have is that every medical school in America has required courses in pediatrics, but only four medical schools in America have required courses in geriatrics," Reid said.

He has also sponsored legislation that would prevent managed care operators from "dumping" seniors from coverage without recourse.

"About 500,000 seniors in the last few weeks have been dropped from these programs, leaving them just stumbling around, not knowing where to go or what to do," Reid said.

Reid would expand Medicare to cover eyeglasses, dental care and prescription drugs. He would also eliminate the $1,500 annual cap under Medicare for physical therapy.

"The reason this is so unfair is $1,500 is more than enough for some problems, but it's not enough for stroke victims and automobile accidents," Reid said.

He also wants to maintain current nursing home standards while establishing a national registry so that employees of nursing homes are "checked to see if they're a criminal or they've ever been abusive to patients in other places."

* Social Security -- Reid authored an unsuccessful proposal in 1997 that would have prevented the Social Security Trust Fund from being used to offset federal budget shortfalls. Had his plan succeeded, that language would have been included in the proposed balanced budget amendment. After his plan failed he voted the next week against the balanced budget amendment, which was defeated by one vote.

Reid said he is wary of investing Social Security funds in the stock market.

"Look what has happened in Japan," he said. "Look what's happened to our stock market, up and down like a boomerang. We need to invest these monies in very safe, secure funds. Government bonds are safe and secure.

"I have no problem taking a very, very small amount of the trust fund and set up test programs around the country and see if it wouldn't hurt to invest a little of it in stocks. My main goal is to make sure we do not become carried away with the need to invest these monies."

Reid also opposes establishment of individual retirement accounts as a replacement for Social Security.

"People talk about Social Security as if it is just a program for old people," he said. "It also takes care of the disabled, and it takes care of widows and orphans. How are you going to get an individual retirement account for somebody who is disabled or somebody who is a widow or an orphan? They're not paying money into the program. They're taking money out."

The senator added that he would apply budget surpluses to reduce the federal debt only after ensuring that Social Security is secure.

"Remember, most of the surplusses now are surplusses created by Social Security money," Reid said.

* Health care -- Reid supports the White House-backed Patients Bill of Rights legislation aimed at reforming managed health care to make it more consumer-friendly. A primary difference with the Republican plan is that the Democrats would allow patients to sue their HMOs.

"There are only two types of people in America you can't sue, foreign diplomats and HMOs," Reid said. "People will say it's going to run up the cost of medicine. In the history of the state of Nevada, there have been less than 40 lawsuits that have gone to a verdict in a medical malpractice case. It doesn't sound to me that there's a rash of lawsuits. Very, very few lawsuits will be filed.

"These insurance companies, these health care providers will know that if they don't follow their rules, there will be somebody there to enforce them. Right now, no one can enforce them."

Reid, who authored a law that makes contraceptive health care coverage available to female federal employees, would like to extend that benefit to all women. He also wants to make it easier to get health coverage for pre-existing conditions and would like to close loopholes that make it difficult for individuals to keep their insurance if they leave a job.

The senator also wants to improve the quality of needle sticks so that health care professionals who give people shots will be better guarded against infections such as from the HIV virus. But he said he opposes Nevada's Question 9 ballot measure, which would legalize marijuana for medical purposes.

"There's too much up in the air, too many unanswered questions," he said.

Reid also believes military veterans should be allowed to take fuller advantage of Veterans Administration hospitals by being able to use Medicare for non-service-connected ailments.

* Nuclear waste -- Reid believes he will be in a better position than his Republican opponent to fight proposals to ship high-level nuclear waste to Nevada.

Chief among his reasons is that if Reid is re-elected, he is virtually assured of becoming the Senate Democratic whip, the number two post in his party. The current whip, Sen. Wendell Ford of Kentucky, is retiring this year.

Reid argued that as whip, he will be able to draw enough Democrats to the anti-nuclear waste position to sustain President Clinton's promised veto. The last time the Senate voted on the proposal, it passed 65-34, falling two votes shy of being veto-proof. All but two of the 'no' votes came from Democrats. Of the 55 Republicans, 53 voted 'yes.'

"You don't need to worry about the Democrats," Reid said. "The Republicans are the ones who have not gone with us. I don't want to be boastful, but I think I could bet pretty good money that some of these (Democratic) senators voted (no) for this because of me.

"I feel pretty comfortable I could pick up a couple more Democrats."

* Defense -- Reid said the nation needs to move away from maintaining the model of large standing armies that this country has had since World War II.

"I believe that we have to go to the model that has been established by the State of Israel, light and lethal, quick mobility, easy to assemble," he said. "When we went to Desert Storm it took weeks and weeks to get (troops) together. It shouldn't be that way."

He also is a supporter of pilotless military aircraft, which he said will be the wave of the future.

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