Word: gephardts
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...presidential nomination in 2000 begins next week. That's when the AFL-CIO, the nation's largest labor union and the Democrats' biggest organized constituency, gathers for its annual conference. The featured entertainment: back-to-back speeches on Feb. 18 by Vice President Gore and House Democratic leader Dick Gephardt, respectively, the heir apparent and the would-be spoiler in the coming battle to succeed Bill Clinton...
Already, tension between the White House and congressional Democrats, and Gore and Gephardt specifically, is infecting Clinton's second term. Certain to be a central topic at the labor conference is the President's offer to curb Medicare spending by $14 billion more than he proposed last winter. Gore will have to defend the larger cut, which White House aides insist was a necessary good-faith gesture toward congressional Republicans. But Gephardt can say the White House is giving away too much, too early. In his first public reaction to Clinton's new Medicare number, the Missouri Democrat said...
Hoping to calm them, White House chief of staff Erskine Bowles early last week called and apologized to both Gephardt and Senate minority leader Tom Daschle for failing to consult them on either the Medicare plan or the President's choice of Colorado Governor Roy Romer as the new party chairman. Bowles promised he would meet with them regularly from now on. But no amount of cajoling from the White House will keep Gephardt from laying more groundwork for a presidential run. Just days before the AFL-CIO conference, he plans to cross the border into Mexico to highlight...
...Gephardt has also warned the Administration against getting budget relief by revising down the Consumer Price Index, which is apparently giving retirees cost of living increases about 30% higher than the rate of inflation. Bringing the CPI even halfway into line with economic reality would shave billions off the deficit. But Clinton and Gore don't need the savings to balance the budget this year, so they'll consider a CPI adjustment down the road...
Clinton's best hope for pushing through legislation is to build a center-right coalition of Democrats and Republicans, though the move risks splitting open his party and giving Gephardt valuable ammunition for a primary run against Gore. House Republican Conference chairman John Boehner foresees multiple coalitions, with swing votes coming from different members on each issue: the balanced budget, a tax cut and stopgap Medicare reform. "The agenda they're talking about is the agenda we're talking about," he says. "It's likely it will become law." Clinton and Trent Lott, the Senate majority leader, have been talking...