Who's Who - politics - Brief Article

From their relentless pursuit of tax cuts for the wealthy--cuts that could bring back deficits--it's clear that the people running the Bush White House can be lured into reckless behavior by the promise of smaller bills from the IRS. This psychological weakness may also explain how Bush's top political adviser Karl Rove got himself in hot water. In March, Rove met with executives from Intel Corporation. The executives used the occasion to press for federal approval of a corporate merger. At the time, Rove owned more than $100,000 of Intel stock. Less than two months later, the Justice Department approved the deal. Democrats such as Rep. Henry Waxman have called for an investigation. The White House insists there was no conflict of interest because Rove played no part in getting the merger approved. But what's interesting is the reason Rove waited until June to divest his stock. According to the Associated Press, he was advised by White House transition counsel Fred Fielding that if he waited and got something called a "government certificate of divestiture" he could "defer paying capital gains taxes on the stock sales."

Speaking of stocks, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill continues to hold part of his $100 million stake in Alcoa, the company he used to run, three months after announcing he would sell his shares. His decision to delay selling the stock, according to Salon's Jake Tapper, could result in a $62 million windfall in large part because Department of Energy officials asked aluminum producers in Washington, Oregon, and Idaho to suspend production of aluminum for up to two years in order to save energy. This momentarily stopped production of almost 40 percent of the country's aluminum-making potential, but not Alcoa's.

The fact that so many top administration officials have big money no doubt explains some of the psychological gap that exists between them and other key Washington players. Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle's biggest financial asset is a half-share of a house in Aberdeen, S.D., given to him by his mother and worth $50,000 to $100,000, according to recently-released congressional disclosure forms. Sen. Jim Jeffords--the man who forced the White House to reduce its tax cut and then bolted the GOP, handing Democrats control of the Senate--listed his main asset as a home in Rutland, VT, valued at $100,001 to $250,000.

Anger over Jeffords' defection has yet to die down. The Vermont senator has received so many death threats that he has been flanked for weeks by two plainclothes Capitol Hill police officers. In the men's room of the Capitol Hill Club, a GOP hangout next to the Republican National Committee headquarters, someone put a photograph of Jeffords in a urinal. "Although several folks apparently got a kick out of taking aim at the photo of a man they now detest," reports Roll Call newspaper's Ed Henry, "a peeved member of the club ripped the photo out of the urinal, fearing it would be seen as yet another symbol of the party's alleged intolerance."

Under President Bill Clinton, the Federal Trade Commission took an activist role, for instance, investigating Hollywood for advertising R-rated fare to teenagers. By contrast, Bush's new FTC chairman, Timothy J. Muris, has promised to keep the agency strictly low-impact. This can be seen in his appointment of J. Howard Beales to the FTC's Consumer Protection Bureau. The former consultant to R.J. Reynolds and long-time advocate of laissez-faire advertising regulation has argued that Joe Camel ads were not targeted at youth.

In the spirit of bipartisanship that has swept Washington since the Senate flip, former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers recently joined conservative pundette Laura Ingraham for lunch at the Palm. "What shorthand phrase will future historians use to describe the Clinton administration?" Ingraham reportedly asked Summers. When he shrugged, she offered, "Sex between the Bushes." Whether Summers laughed at the joke could not be discerned.

A couple of months ago, "Who's Who" was wondering whether Joseph Allbaugh had been exiled from the White House to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) by his former pals Karl Rove and Karen Hughes. Here is another explanation: Much of what George W. Bush does--e.g. cutting taxes--is designed to avoid repeating apparent mistakes made by his father. In FEMA's case, miserable performance in the wake of hurricane Andrew was thought to have cost Bush Sr. at the polls. So it may be that it wasn't Machiavellian machinations by Rove and Hughes, but simply W.'s desire to guard against another Andrew that landed this trusted aide at FEMA.

On June 7, a dinner was held at the National Press Club to honor N. Sanders Saul. This, you may recall, is the judge who managed to delay the Florida recount for 11 days, making it possible for the Supreme Court to rule that the recount had run out of time. He also ruled against Al Gore in practically every issue and even ignored testimony by a Bush expert witness that a hand recount was the way to go. The MC at the event was Court TV's Catherine Crier, which should remove any doubt about where she stands.