<GOP Stews at Dems' 'Shameful' Attack on Bush, 11/30
Republicans expressed shock and disgust today that House
Democrats planned to blame the economic downturn on
President Bush.
"The bottom line is, this is George Bush's recession,"
Rep. Nita Lowey, Democratic Congressional Campaign
Committee chief, says in today's edition of USA Today.
A spokesman for the National Republican Congressional
Committee called the comments of Lowey, D-N.Y.,
"despicable" and predicted the attack would backfire.
"I think it shows incredibly poor political judgment to
attack a president with an 86 percent approval rating,"
said NRCC communications director Steve Schmidt.
"The economy was in a slowdown in the last days of the
Clinton administration, and the slowdown was exacerbated
by the Sept. 11 attacks."
Fox News Channel reported tonight that former Clinton
strategist James Carville and others planned the negative
campaign a month ago.
Equating the television advertising campaign to a
political attack on the president in a time of war, Senate
Minority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., described it nearly
in terms of treason.
"This is shameful, absurd and very poorly timed,” Lott
told reporters today.
House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said in a statement:
"I understand that the Democratic Congressional Campaign
Committee will run an advertising campaign that seeks to
attack President Bush for his efforts to provide economic
security for the American people.
"I find it said that the Democratic Congressional Campaign
Committee would seek to profit politically from the
slowdown in the economy caused in part by the events of
Sept. 11."
One DCCC staffer who refused to be identified told United
Press International that the ad campaign would not blame
President Bush, but Lowey's revelation to USA Today
exposed that claim as untrue.
Senate plurality leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., insisted that
his party was patriotic.
"I haven't seen the ads," he told reporters Friday. "I'd
want to see them before I comment.
"I would just say that I think that there is sensitivity
right now in the administration about the Bush economy.
We're in a recession. The budget director has just
announced that we would be in deficits for several years.
That is something we predicted a long time ago. We said
last spring, 'You pass that tax cut, we're going to see
deficits.' Now the administration agrees with us."
Of course, as shrewd former Clintonoid Dick Morris has
pointed out, the Democrats are stalling action on an
economic stimulus because they want to prolong the
recession for political gain.
The big question is whether the GOP will, as usual, stand
around and huff as the Democrats play dirty pool and win,
or whether it will return fire for once.> |
