Reid sets new partisan tone

Benjamin Grove

Friday, Sept. 9, 2005 | 9:25 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid this week led an aggressive multi-pronged attack on Republicans, with the Bush administration bearing the brunt for its response to Hurricane Katrina.

As lawmakers swept back into Washington for their first week back after an August recess, the political mood was noticeably more partisan and bitter than it was following the tragedy of Sept. 11, 2001.

Reid, D-Nev., on Thursday, as he had done earlier in the week, lashed out at the Federal Emergency Management Agency for failing the residents of the Gulf Coast. He again called for an independent investigation -- separate from probes being planned by the White House.

"The administration will not be investigating itself," Reid said.

At a press conference Reid questioned whether FEMA should even be managing the disaster relief, saying the additional $51.8 billion Congress approved Thursday -- most of it for FEMA -- might be better spent in the hands of a new entity modeled on the Tennessee Valley Authority.

"After everything that has happened with FEMA, is there anyone -- anyone -- who believes that we should continue to let the money go to FEMA and be distributed by them?" Reid asked.

Reid this week also fired off a letter to Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, chairwoman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, listing 13 issues her panel should investigate, including:

Republicans countered that Democratic leaders were playing politics with the disaster.

"While countless Americans are pulling together to lend a helping hand, (House Democratic Leader) Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are pointing fingers in a shameless effort to tear us apart," Republican Party chief Ken Mehlman said in a statement.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan bristled at Reid's "personal attacks," especially his suggestion that the president's vacation could have affected the response. The White House is "focused on bringing everybody together to help the people in the region. And the president continues to act to make sure that we're addressing the ongoing problems," McClellan said.

Conservative syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer, writing today, said Congress also deserves some blame and is "playing holier-than-thou."

"Perhaps it might ask itself who created the Department of Homeland Security in the first place. The congressional response to all crisis is the same -- rearrange the bureaucratic boxes, but be sure to add one extra layer," he wrote.

But Reid did not stop with the letter. On Thursday he and other Senate Democrats introduced their version of a Katrina relief bill, saying Republican leaders in Washington had been dragging their feet. The bill seeks to cut red tape and speed health care, housing, educational and other benefits to hurricane victims. For example, the bill aims to provide victims with emergency housing vouchers and seeks to get Medicaid payments to victims wherever they are now. It offers victims a moratorium of 180 days on federal loans.

"Just throwing money isn't the answer," Reid said.

Earlier this week, Reid and other top Democrats also requested that GOP Senate and budget committee leaders reconsider this year's budget resolution, a framework that Reid said aims to cut taxes for the wealthy and cuts programs for the poor, including hurricane victims. It could translate to cuts in Medicaid, food stamps, and student loans that potentially could hurt Katrina survivors, the Democratic leaders said.

Nothing could be further from the truth, said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H. He argued that tax cuts stimulate the economy. He said the budget framework calls for a 1 percent cut in Medicaid growth over five years and that federal savings will not come until year two -- so there will be no immediate impact.