WASHINGTON — It was part economic talk show, part political tent revival.
The White House pulled out all the stops Wednesday as it convened a two-day conference to drum up support for restructuring Social Security, overhauling the tax code, curbing "lawsuit abuse" and enacting President Bush's other second-term priorities.
Vice President Dick Cheney welcomed the participants and then sat almost wordlessly through a panel discussion on "The State of Our Economy."
President Bush participated in an hourlong session called "The High Costs of Lawsuit Abuse."
Treasury Secretary John W. Snow dangled the prospect of more tax cuts, and Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson bemoaned the high cost of medical care.
One after another, a hand-picked collection of economists, experts and business executives served up an unrelenting -- and unstinting -- series of testimonials to the wisdom of the president's economic priorities. To a person, they urged the administration to do more of the same.
"Thank God the election is over," said Mary Farrell, managing director of UBS Wealth Management of New York. "I have never seen so much economic misinformation and illiteracy out there in the marketplace. We have a wonderful economy."
One thing the opening day was not was a frank exchange of ideas.
There was no hint of disapproval of Bush's across-the-board tax reductions, which the president and many economists credited with stirring a recovery but which had also contributed to widening budget deficits. There was no criticism of Bush's goal of allowing workers to divert some of their Social Security taxes into private accounts, which some analysts worried could weaken the public retirement program.
What passed for an off-message moment came during the litigation panel, when Yale University law professor George Priest described as "small steps" the president's goal of curbing asbestos litigation, combating class-action lawsuits and capping financial awards to patients injured in medical malpractice cases.
A short time later, Bush good-naturedly set the record straight, saying that his plan amounted to "a huge step."
And so it went.
In denouncing what he regularly derides as "frivolous and junk lawsuits," Bush used some of his strongest language yet in making his case for passing limits on class-action, asbestos injury and medical malpractice cases.
