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5 Democratic Senators Hit Quayle Competitive Panel : Budget debate: Glenn charges council ‘operates in a shroud of secrecy’ to undermine workplace, environmental and health safety laws.

From Associated Press

Five Democratic senators stepped up partisan attacks Thursday on a council led by Vice President Dan Quayle that reviews federal regulations, but they conceded that their plan to eliminate the group’s funds was only a symbolic gesture.

Sen. John Glenn led the attack on the Council on Competitiveness the same day that Quayle was campaigning in Glenn’s home state of Ohio.

Glenn, at a news conference with the other senators, accused the council of operating “in a shroud of secrecy” to undermine environmental, health and workplace safety laws.

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He said Senate Democrats would try to eliminate the council’s money from the appropriations bill covering the White House. But he acknowledged, “We don’t really stop the operation” because most council employees are actually on the payroll of other Administration offices.

Campaigning in Wilmington, Ohio, Quayle called the council “the last line of resistance in protecting the consumers of America against an overzealous federal bureaucracy.”

Quayle took a slap at Glenn and the other critics of the council. “Apparently Sen. Glenn wants to be on the side of the federal bureaucrats,” he said.

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Quayle spokesman Jeff Nesbit said if the funds were eliminated, President Bush likely would veto the larger appropriations bill in which they would have been contained.

“It’s more the principle,” he said. “What they are doing is attacking the prerogatives the President has to make sure the executive branch reviews the impact these regulations have on people’s lives.”

“This is partisan politics,” he added.

The news conference continued a string of Democratic attacks on the council, which has operated in private to change government regulations on air pollution, food labeling, building access for the disabled and other issues.

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Quayle’s office has said the council reviews government regulations, and orders them changed if they would unnecessarily burden individuals and small businesses.

The House already has voted to eliminate the council’s $86,000 budget, which would eliminate two staff members. But Nesbit confirmed that virtually all the staff work is done by people on some other offices’ payrolls.

In a related development, the Democrat-controlled House Government Operations Committee, in a 23-15 party line vote, approved legislation that would require the council to make public virtually all its actions and meetings, including meetings between the council and special interests.

The bill, sponsored by committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) goes to the full House.

At the news conference Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) held up the pen he was given when Bush signed the 1990 Clean Air Act.

Baucus said: “This pen should not be a pen. It should be a giant eraser” because the Quayle-led council wiped out the tough enforcement measures envisioned by the anti-pollution law’s sponsors.

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Others criticizing the council were Sens. Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, Timothy E. Wirth of Colorado and Carl Levin of Michigan.

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