Much Ado, but Not Much Action

By Evan Thomas

The President and Congress square off for a fractious session

The word bipartisan appeared seven times in the President's State of the Union address last week, but the decision to stress a new spirit of cooperation apparently did not reach the White House guards. When Tip O'Neill appeared at the Executive mansion on the day of the speech for a conference with the President, the gatekeepers would not let him in. The rotund, white-maned Speaker of the House had to fish around for some identification. O'Neill handled the unintentional rebuff amiably enough, but once he got inside, his Irish was up over an entirely different matter. The Democratic congressional leader vigorously berated the President for deceiving him, and the American public, on the mission of U.S. troops in Lebanon. "Every time I talk to you, you say things are going well," O'Neill spluttered. "But there's nothing but deterioration over there."

The tongue-lashing was a better indication of what the President can expect from Congress this year than was the applause he got later that evening. Like Reagan's speech, the second session of the 98th Congress is likely to be remembered more for rhetoric than substance. The lawmakers are slated to convene for only 29 weeks, and most Congressmen will spend more time on the campaign trail than at the Capitol. On the House and Senate floors, political posturing will take precedence over legislating.

The noise will be loudest about Lebanon. O'Neill last week claimed that half of the 123 Democrats who voted in September to allow the Marines to stay in Lebanon for 18 months would now vote to bring them home. He predicted that a resolution to that effect would reach the House floor in about a month. Though Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker insists that his Republicans will back the President, many are restlessly eyeing opinion polls favoring withdrawal. "There is a lot of discontent on our side," says G.O.P. Senator William Cohen of Maine. Still, few Congressmen want to be blamed for "losing Lebanon." As a result, Congress may seek a compromise. Among the proposals: stationing the troops on ships offshore and ferrying them to the mainland for patrols; calling for the accelerated withdrawal of the Marines, but without setting a deadline that would encourage the Syrians to outwait the U.S.; and replacing the U.S. troops with a United Nations peace-keeping force (a plan the Soviets would surely veto).

Congress is expected to approve little if any of the $8 billion in economic aid to Central America called for by the Kissinger commission and endorsed by Reagan. El Salvador is not likely to get more money unless progress is made in curbing the right-wing death squads there. Congress is expected to fight Reagan's attempts to avoid the practice of tying Salvadoran aid to regular certifications of improvement in that country's human rights record.

But while lawmakers may resist adding to the projected deficit of nearly $200 billion, they will be hard put to cut it. The Democrats are wary of Reagan's call for a bipartisan panel to recommend a "down payment." Nonetheless, to avoid appearing obstructionist, they named two emissaries--House Majority Leader James Wright and Senator Daniel Inouye--to meet with Republican leaders. Said Democrat Timothy Wirth of Colorado: "I hope the deficit initiative is a foot in the door, but I think it's more likely a fig leaf."

Administration aides said that the President's budget, which goes to the Hill this week, already includes about half the $100 billion in deficit reductions that Reagan seeks. However, those are the same spending cuts and revenue raisers that he proposed and Congress rejected a year ago. The President gingerly suggested that Congress start with some of the "less contentious" ones. The next day, Treasury Secretary Donald Regan offered an example: delaying cost of living increases for federal retirees, a $300 million item in fiscal 1985 affecting 2.9 million people. "You call that one of the less contentious items?" Senator William Proxmire incredulously demanded. "Try to tell that to my federal retirees in Wisconsin."

O'Neill insisted that he would not even begin to bargain with the Republicans so long as defense was a "sacred cow." A White House official said that defense "will be on the table--in a modest way." But the Pentagon cuts the White House has in mind, like eliminating unnecessary military bases, are precisely those the congressional pork-barrelers will resist.

Congress is also likely to balk at the constitutional amendments Reagan seeks to curb its spending habits. In 43 states, Governors wield some form of a "line item veto" over their state legislatures. But powerful congressional committee chairmen are not about to let the President pick through their spending bills line by line because that would undercut their budget-writing authority and make it almost impossible to protect the pork they vote for the folks back home. Reagan's proposal for a balanced-budget amendment was rejected by Congress 16 months ago, and probably will be again. His exhortations seemed designed to raise the specter of a constitutional convention on a balanced-budget amendment, which 32 of the necessary 34 states have already endorsed.

Financial constraints could doom or curtail a permanent manned space station, and Congress may resist research funds for a new line of star wars weaponry the President will seek in his defense budget. Congress is sure to go along with only one presidential request for more money: to clean up the environment. Indeed, Democrats vying for the "green vote" are likely to go the President one better and push for controls on acid rain, a problem Reagan vowed only to study.

On the more immediate issues, such as the deficit and Lebanon, however, Congress is unlikely to be able to act on its own. The legislature usually lacks the political will to overrule the Chief Executive on foreign policy or to raise taxes over his opposition, especially when there is a chance that its actions might prove unpopular during an election year. Pressing as these matters may be, they may have to wait for another year, or for another Administration. --By Evan Thomas. Reported by David Beckwith and Neil MacNeil/ Washington

With reporting by David Beckwith, Neil MacNeil