**Gulf Coast\'s rebuilding bills expose a GOP split**

By Rick Klein, Globe Staff \| September 22, 2005

WASHINGTON \-- The vast new spending needed to rebuild the storm-ravaged
Gulf Coast is emboldening conservative lawmakers to call for fresh
rounds of budget cuts, exposing fissures between the White House and
rank-and-file Republicans in Congress over federal priorities.

Yesterday, the Republican Study Committee, a group of more than 100
conservative House members, say they have compiled a package of proposed
cuts that would save the federal government more than \$139 billion next
year. It calls for eliminating subsidies for public broadcasting and
Amtrak, and for sharply limiting foreign aid, among a wide range of
other proposals.

Even some of President Bush\'s most cherished priorities are coming
under scrutiny. The committee wants to kill Bush\'s idea to send manned
spacecraft to the moon and Mars and cut the \'\'Millennium Challenge
Accounts\" the president wants as rewards for nations that make strides
toward economic and personal freedom.

And a growing number of Republicans are asking for a one-year delay in
implementing the new Medicare prescription drug benefit, which would
begin Jan. 1. The delay would save the federal government about \$30
billion in 2006, money that some Republicans say would be better spent
on rebuilding New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

\'\'I think it should be pushed back. The cost is excessive,\" said
Senator Trent Lott, a former Senate Republican leader whose home state
of Mississippi was among those suffering devastation from Hurricane
Katrina. \'\'We\'ll have to sort of look our hand over in every area.\"

So far, Congress has appropriated about \$62 billion for hurricane
relief efforts, and some lawmakers have suggested that the final cost of
the disaster could top \$200 billion. Without budget cuts or tax
increases, the money spent on relief and rebuilding will be added to the
deficit, which stands at \$330 billion for this fiscal year.

Hardly anyone in Congress questions the need for federal spending on the
hurricane recovery or its cost. But the debate over how the government
should pay for it has split the Republican Party at a time that opinion
polls show Bush\'s job approval ratings at record lows, due in part to
the federal government\'s flat-footed response to the Katrina disaster.

Bush had pledged to halve the deficit by the end of his term, but the
federal government was spending at a prodigious rate long before Katrina
struck. The cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have reached a
combined \$250 billion, and this summer, the president signed a \$286
billion highway bill that earmarked \$25 billion for lawmakers\' pet
projects.

Rampant spending under Republican control of Washington has upset many
GOP lawmakers, who are worried about the rising cost estimates for the
prescription drug measure. That bill, once touted as costing less than
\$400 billion over 10 years, is now expected to cost at least \$700
billion over 10 years, as the program grows more expensive in future
years.

\'\'People here think we make tough decisions, but we . . . just pass
them along to our grandchildren,\" said Representative Lynn A.
Westmoreland, Republican of Georgia. \'\'If the federal government were
a business . . . we\'d be filing for bankruptcy.\"

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert yesterday downplayed the party rift
between fiscal conservatives and congressional and White House
leadership, noting that no one knows yet how much additional money will
be needed to rebuild Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi. He said he
will listen to any ideas for spending cuts.

But, underscoring the politics of budget cuts, Hastert quickly noted
that he considers the Medicare prescription drug benefit and the highway
bill to be off-limits. \'\'I don\'t think it would be prudent at this
time to say that we\'re going to stop our Medicare program,\" the
Illinois Republican said.

But \'\'deficit hawk\" conservatives are serving notice that they won\'t
stand idly by to watch deficits skyrocket. One of them, Representative
Mike Pence, Republican of Indiana, said he will fight any additional
spending on hurricane recovery unless it\'s paid for by budget cuts.
\'\'I am not prepared to support additional relief if that means piling
debt on our children and grandchildren,\" said Pence, chairman of the
GOP study committee. \'\'Our analysis suggests that there is more than
enough room for cuts in the federal budget to pay for Katrina.\"

So far, the White House has deflected specific questions on how Katrina
efforts should be funded. Bush administration officials have said that
because hurricane recovery is a one-time expense, it won\'t have a
long-term effect on the nation\'s fiscal picture, though they have
conceded the massive financial investment may force them to shuffle some
priorities.

The president has dispatched top budget officials to Capitol Hill to
meet with lawmakers about possible budget cuts, but the administration
so far has not suggested any cuts. White House press secretary Scott
McClellan said yesterday that the administration will work with Congress
to find \'\'unnecessary spending,\" but that Congress should enact cuts
Bush proposed to Medicaid and other programs first.

Other programs conservatives recommended cutting include school lunches,
rent subsidies for the poor, and anti-drug programs in schools, as well
as ending taxpayer support for presidential campaigns and political
conventions. Many cuts, including ending subsidies for public
broadcasting and Amtrak, have failed when Republicans tried to enact
them as recently as this spring.

Democrats have already blasted Republicans for insensitivity to the
poor, pointing to their pre-Katrina plan to proceed with \$10 billion in
cuts to Medicaid, the health program for low-income people. The grinding
poverty the storm exposed means more federal aid should go to the poor,
and Republicans should ask the wealthiest Americans to give up portions
of recent tax cuts Bush gave them, said Representative Edward J. Markey,
a Malden Democrat.

\'\'They\'re so committed to their tax cuts for the rich, it\'s as if
they didn\'t learn anything from Katrina,\" Markey said. \'\'President
Bush and the Republicans have to ask the millionaires to sacrifice.\"

Karlyn Bowman, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute,
noted that Republican disagreements over the White House\'s Katrina
spending feed existing tensions in the party that date to 2000, when
candidate George W. Bush \-- positioning himself as a \'\'compassionate
conservative\" \-- favored an expanded role for the federal government
in such areas as education.

In the 2004 elections, Bowman said, \'\'party loyalty trumped
divisions.\" Whether Republicans in the 2006 midterm elections distance
themselves from Bush \'\'will depend on his approval numbers and how
strong he is. Right now he looks very weak,\" she said.

Nina J. Easton of the Globe staff contributed to this report.