Leading conservatives in the House of Representatives are angry, yet again, with Newt Gingrich for caving too quickly to Bill Clinton. The subject: anti- terrorism legislation. When Clinton convened a summit meeting with the leaders of Congress on the subject two days after the bombing at the Atlanta Olympics, he used the occasion to press for measures the Republican Congress had already defeated. Gingrich, who has said he goes weak in the knees whenever he is in proximity to the president, readily agreed to take up again the provisions his troops had already rejected. This was in sharp contrast to Senate majority leader Trent Lott, who staunchly said there was no time to consider such legislation before the August recess.
After heated negotiations, at House bill, minus a provision on so-called roving wiretaps, was due to be passed at press time. The central irritation is that conservative House members feel they were railroaded into acceding to Clinton. In this case, however, Gingrich surely had a point; as a political matter, the president could really make hay out of two — count ’em, two — rejections of tough-on-terrorism ideas by the supposedly tough-on-crime Republican House.
