Editorial: Full-court press by president

Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2002 | 8:53 a.m.

On Tuesday the Senate passed House legislation creating a new Homeland Security Department, and the bill now goes to President Bush for his signature. Placing all the domestic security agencies under one roof is a wise step, even though the massive reorganization of 170,000 employees will take considerable time and effort. But ultimately a unified department should lead to better coordination and, in the end, better protection for our nation. Unfortunately, however, the Senate failed to strip several provisions in the House version of the bill that never should have been included in the first place.

One of the provisions that has generated the most controversy is the president's insistence that civil service protections be weakened. There was no need for this, however, and no one demonstrated that workers who had civil service protections wouldn't continue to do excellent work in defending our nation. Apparently, the president and Republican congressional leaders seemed to forget that police officers and firefighters, many of whom lost their lives trying to save others in the 9-11 terrorist attacks, were members of unions. The legislation also contained special interest measures that had no relation to national security, such as protecting pharmaceutical companies from lawsuits filed over the side effects caused by the vaccines they make. Democrats contended that the measure, which would be retroactive to lawsuits already in the pipeline, would apply to lawsuits involving claims that some ingredients of vaccines caused autism in children. Yet another part of the bill weak! ens an earlier attempt by the late Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., to prohibit companies from getting homeland security contracts if they have set up offshore to avoid paying U.S. taxes.

The president in recent months has pushed hard for a Homeland Security Department. But we shouldn't forget that it was Bush, the self-styled opponent of big government, and congressional Republicans who originally opposed the agency's creation. It was only after Bush had placed into the legislation provisions that weakened civil service protections for new employees of the department that he took a liking to a unified approach to homeland security. Bush felt so strongly about diluting civil service protections that he used it as a political club against Senate Democrats running for re-election who didn't share his view. Not even Georgia's Max Cleland, who lost two legs and an arm serving his country in Vietnam, was immune to the president's criticism, which contributed to his defeat.

Although only three Democrats on Tuesday voted for an amendment that would have removed the special interest protections in the bill, most Senate Democrats seemed resigned to the legislation's passage loaded with unnecessary provisions. Among Republicans, only the maverick John McCain was willing to stand up to the White House and vote against the president. Bush's popularity likely played a role in several moderate Republicans -- Rhode Island's Lincoln Chafee and Maine's Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe -- to vote against the removal of favors for special interest groups. The moderate Republican trio who sided with the president said they only did so after receiving assurances from Republican Senate Leader Trent Lott that next year some of the provisions they didn't like, such as the drug maker protection, would be undone by new legislation. But if that pl edge is sincere, why not just take the provisions out of the bill now?

The president can be expected to continue to aggressively push his agenda now that the Republicans have control of the legislative and executive branches. It will take strong-willed moderate Democrats and Republicans to put the brakes on bad legislation that include sops to special interests and corporations -- and Tuesday's outcome wasn't an encouraging sign.