- WASHINGTON -- Faced with
one of the worst political crises of his administration, President Bush
abruptly overhauled his September schedule on Saturday as the White House
scrambled to gain control of a situation that Republicans said threatened
to undermine Mr. Bush's second-term agenda and the party's long-term ambitions.
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- In a sign of the mounting anxiety at the White House,
Mr. Bush made a rare Saturday appearance in the Rose Garden before live
television cameras to announce that he was dispatching additional active-duty
troops to the Gulf Coast. He struck a more somber tone than he had at times
on Friday during a daylong tour of the disaster region, when he had joked
at the airport in New Orleans about the fun he had had in his younger days
in Houston. His demeanor on Saturday was similar to that of his most somber
speeches after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
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- "The magnitude of responding to a crisis over a
disaster area that is larger than the size of Great
Britain has created tremendous problems that have strained state and
local capabilities," said Mr. Bush, slightly exaggerating the stricken
land area. "The result is that many of our citizens simply are not
getting the help they need, especially in New Orleans. And that is unacceptable."
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- The president was flanked by his high military and emergency
command: Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Homeland Security Secretary
Michael Chertoff and Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff.
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- As Mr. Bush spoke, Vice President Dick Cheney and Karl
Rove, the president's senior political adviser, listened on the sidelines,
as did Dan Bartlett, the counselor to the president and Mr. Bush's overseer
of communications strategy. Their presence underscored how seriously the
White House is reacting to the political crisis it faces.
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- "Where our response is not working, we'll make it
right," Mr. Bush said, as Mr. Bartlett, with a script in his hand,
followed closely.
-
- His speech came as analysts and some Republicans warned
that the White House's response to the crisis in New Orleans, which has
been widely seen as slow and ineffectual, could further undermine
Mr. Bush's authority at a time when he was already under fire, endangering
his Congressional agenda.
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- Mr. Chertoff said Saturday: "Not an hour goes by
that we do not spend a lot of time thinking about the people who are actively
suffering. The United States, as the president has said, is going to move
heaven and earth to rescue, feed, shelter" victims of the storm.
-
- The White House said Mr. Bush would return to Louisiana
and Mississippi
on Monday, scrapping his plans for a Labor Day address in Maryland.
The rest of Mr. Bush's schedule next week was in flux.
-
- The White House also postponed a major visit to Washington
next week by President Hu Jintao of China.
In a statement issued on Saturday, the White House said both Mr. Hu and
Mr. Bush had agreed that "in the present circumstances, it was best
not to have" the meeting, which would have demanded much of the president's
attention over the next days on growing difficulties between the United
States and China over trade frictions, North
Korea's nuclear program and China's military buildup.
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- The last-minute overhaul of the president's plans reflected
what analysts and some Republicans said was a long-term threat to Mr. Bush's
presidency created by the perception that the White House had failed to
respond to the crisis. Several said the political fallout over the hurricane
could complicate a second-term agenda that includes major changes to Social
Security, the tax code and the immigration system.
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- "This is very much going to divert the agenda,"
said Tom Rath, a New
Hampshire Republican with ties to the White House. "Some of this
is momentary. I think the Bush capital will be rapidly replenished if they
begin to respond here."
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- Donald P. Green, a professor of political science at
Yale University, said: "The possibility for very serious damage to
the administration exists. The unmistakable conclusion one would draw from
this was this was a massive administration failure."
-
- And Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker, urged Mr.
Bush to quickly propose a rebuilding plan for New Orleans and the rest
of the Gulf Coast, arguing that an ambitious gesture could restore his
power in Congress.
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- "If it's done right, it adds energy to the rest
of his agenda," Mr. Gingrich said. "If it's done wrong, it swamps
the rest of his agenda."
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- The silence of many prominent Democrats reflects their
conclusion that the president is on treacherous political ground and that
attacking him would permit the White House to dismiss the criticism as
partisan politics-as-usual, a senior Democratic aide said.
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- Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, disputed
the notion that Mr. Bush's long-term political viability was endangered
and said Saturday that he was confident the administration would be able
to push ahead successfully with its second-term agenda. "There are
a number of priorities, and we will address all of them," he said.
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- For all the enormity of the destruction and the lingering
uncertainty about how many years it will take to "rebuild the great
city of New Orleans," as Mr. Bush said in his remarks on Saturday,
some Republicans suggested that the impact could prove fleeting in this
age of fast-moving events, and that Mr. Bush's visit to the region on Friday
had helped some in addressing concerns about his response.
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- "Next Tuesday the Roberts hearings start, and that's
going to occupy a significant part of the daily coverage," said Richard
N. Bond, a former Republican chairman, referring to the Supreme Court confirmation
hearings of Judge John G. Roberts Jr.
-
- But others said the damage could prove enduring, and
they warned that the inevitable battery of official investigations into
what went wrong could further erode support for the war in Iraq
if it turned out that the deployment of National Guard units to Iraq had
contributed to the slow response. They said any thought that memories of
New Orleans will fade would be checked by gas prices that spiked as Louisiana
refineries shut down, particularly given that there was already evidence
that rising gas prices were hurting Mr. Bush's political standing.
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- Beyond that, some Republicans said the perception among
some blacks that the White House had been slow to respond because so many
victims were poor and African-American undercut what had been one of the
primary initiatives of the new Republican chairman, Ken Mehlman: making
an explicit appeal for support among black voters, a constituency that
has traditionally been overwhelmingly Democratic.
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- "Given the racial component of this, and given the
current political environment, there certainly seems to be a high level
of risk to this story," said a Republican Party official, who, citing
the concern among party officials about the criticism, would only discuss
the question on the condition of not being identified.
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- But Mr. Bush, reflecting concern within the White House
about the president's standing among blacks, notably said in his radio
address that "we have a responsibility to our brothers and sisters
all along the Gulf Coast, and we will not rest until we get this right
and the job is done."
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- Both Republicans and Democrats noted that the reaction
to the crisis has been nothing like what happened after the terrorist attacks
of Sept. 11, 2001, when both parties joined in a bipartisan show of unity
in the face of a clear and identifiable outside threat.
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- Hurricane Katrina struck at a time, they said, when Mr.
Bush was already in a weakened state, with his approval rating in many
national polls at the lowest level of his presidency and his political
capital in Washington diminishing.
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- The shifting dynamics on Capitol Hill was clear as Congress
returned to Washington to allocate billions of dollars for the relief effort.
Congressional leaders suggested that the White House needed to reconsider
its legislative agenda. "This is not going to help Social Security,"
said Representative
Rahm Emanuel, Democrat of Illinois. "And it was already on its
last legs."
-
- Representative Roy
Blunt of Missouri, the Republican whip, said it would be a mistake
to abandon efforts to reduce the estate tax, arguing that was precisely
what the economy needed to grow. But he said he thought the White House
might reconsider what it wanted this fall.
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- "I think the administration needs to be thinking
about what their agenda is for the fall," he said. "And I'm sure
there will be some re-evaluation."
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- Richard W. Stevenson contributed reporting for this article.
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