CONTENTS

FROM TRENT LOTT TO BILL FRIST

INAUGURATION DAY

"This will be by far the biggest counter-inauguration since the 1973 Nixon counter-inauguration," predicted Brian Becker, co-director of the International Action Center in New York Becker. "We organize protests not infrequently, and we know when something has legs and when it doesn't have legs. This one does." (Washington Post, December 21, 2000)

At the second inauguration of Richard Nixon, police estimated there were 25,000 to 100,000 demonstrators, including some who threw fruit and stones at Nixon's car. The total crowd was about 300,000. Bush's inauguration was much smaller as few bared the sleet and snow along Pennsylvania Avenue.

A rainbow of left-leaning groups displayed outrage at a variety of demons, including racism, the death penalty, and the corporate influence on politics. But complaints that some Florida votes were not counted, including those of many Blacks, had given demonstrators other powerful and common issues. The National Organization for Women was there. "It's important for our own spirit to let people know there is a place to plug in, take that anger and use it to fuel some additional activism," NOW President Patricia Ireland said. The Reverend Al Sharpton and the Reverend Walter Fauntroy staged a "shadow inauguration" outside the United States Supreme Court to swear in those pledging to uphold the Voting Rights Act.

Despite the inclement weather as well as extraordinary security precautions, thousands of protesters passed through police checkpoints and submitted to searches along Pennsylvania Avenue. There were miles of steel fencing, and Secret Service agents in long black overcoats jogged alongside the motorcade. The security frustrated even Bush supporters. GOP Congressman Tom Davis of Virginia said, according to the New York Times (January 21, 2001), "Security is tighter than it needs to be."

"Hail to the Thief," read one sign along the parade route questioning the legitimacy of Bush's election win in Florida. Other protesters held signs, The Illegitimate Son of a Bush," "Don't Blame Me, I Voted with the Majority," and "The People Have Voted -- All Five of Them." One American flag bore the logo, "SOLD" stamped across the stripes. Along most of the parade route Bush was jeered with chants of "Not My President!" Protesters were so thick at one point that the presidential motorcade paused for five minutes before reaching it, then sped by, forcing the Secret Service escort to break into a sprint to keep up. Only at the very end of the route, where few demonstrators had gathered, did the President muster the courage to emerge from behind the tinted windows of his limo and walk through the street. One protester climbed atop a traffic light pole and set fire to a small American flag as hundreds of fellow demonstrators on the street cheered. (The Nation, February 12, 2001)

Protesters clashed briefly with police clad in riot gear at a few flash points while Bush remained inside his armored car for most of the parade route. Police ordered the motorcade to slow in anticipation of some protests -- at one point stopping it for five minutes -- and then sped it through others. A couple of protesters threw bottles and tomatoes before the presidential limousine arrived, and one hurled an egg that landed near the motorcade. But the protesters managed little else to interrupt the festivities in the face of a massive show of 7,000 police officers. Authorities arrested only six people and activists began to disperse. One of them was charged with assault with a deadly weapon after slashing tires and trying to assault an officer.

Demonstrators marched in other cities throughout the United States. The largest protest outside of the nation's capitol took place in Tallahassee, Florida and was staged by a coalition of labor and civil rights groups, including Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. According to the Washington Post (January 21, 2001), organizers said an estimated 100 busloads of protesters poured in from as far away as Ohio to express their displeasure in "A Day of Moral Outrage" over a new president whom speakers repeatedly described as "selected, not elected." Many in the crowd hoisted signs that said, "The NAACP Says, We Won't Forget," and "We Were Bush- Whacked."

But the commercial television networks paid scant attention to these activities on the nightly news. The New York Times (January 21, 2001)buried less than 600 words towards the end of the first section. The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times did about the same. It was the international media that focused more candidly on the Washington protesters. Mexico's La Jornada placed a photo of the protests on its front page, just above an image of Bush being sworn in. Britain's The Guardian headlined their inauguration story, "Bush faces jeers, not cheers" and mentioned that American television commentators tried "their best to talk over the boos, adopting a pomp-and-ceremony tone for the occasion."

Meanwhile, Bush took the presidential oath and read his 15 minute inaugural address with platitudes of "unity," prepared by speech-writers. Sandwiched on both sides of his speech, Bush's first act as president was to have Protestant Evangelist ministers officially dedicate the inauguration to Jesus Christ, who was declared to be "our savior." Invoking "the Father, the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ" and "the Holy Spirit," Billy Graham's son, the one selected by Bush to bless his presidency, excluded the tens of millions of Americans who were Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Shintoists, Unitarians, agnostics, and atheists. The inauguration ended with another Protestant minister inviting all who agreed that Jesus was "the Christ" to say, "Amen."

If Bush wanted Americans to accept him as their president, he made an inauspicious beginning by allowing two divisive and inappropriate prayers. The message reflected the country as Bush's America which was only for Christians. It was Bush's America where non-Christians were welcome only if they agreed to accept their status as a tolerated minority rather than as fully equal citizens. In effect, Bush was saying, according to Alan Dershowitz (Los Angeles Times, January 24, 2001), "This is our home, and in our home we pray to Jesus as our savior. If you want to be a guest in our home, you must accept the way we pray." The United States was not founded as a Christian nation. And the United States was a different and more religiously diverse nation than in years past. In 2001, there were many more Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, and others who did not accept Jesus as their savior.

Many Christian leaders objected to the inaugural prayers. Reverend Barry Lynn, a United Church of Christ minister and executive director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, called the inaugural prayers "inappropriate and insensitive," according to the Washington Post (January 27, 2001). He noted that Graham's invocation also asked God to give the president and his advisers "the courage to say no to all that is contrary to Your statutes and holy law." Graham was thereby placing God's law above the country's, Lynn said. "In a secular society, that is wrong," he said, adding that John Ashcroft promised during his Senate confirmation hearings to uphold laws that might conflict with his personal beliefs. Lynn's greatest concern was for Caldwell's prayer. "It was an astonishing benediction that is highly exclusionary. It's as if he has created a two-tiered system for Americans: those able to say amen -- Christians -- and those who can't."

Elliott Abrams, president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and head of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, said he did not believe clergy should "keep their faith hidden" at public events. And asking Christians to omit any reference to Jesus, he said, "is a rather large demand." But he termed "unfortunate" Caldwell's phrase asking those who agreed that Jesus's name is above all to say "amen." It put non-Christians in the public position of either voicing agreement with a belief they did not accept or appearing to reject the cooperative spirit of the occasion, said Abrams, a former assistant attorney general and author of "Faith or Fear: How Jews Can Survive in a Christian America."

Caldwell, in an interview, said it was not his "intent or desire to exclude or offend anyone" and apologized if he had done so. "I was invited by a Christian to offer a prayer. And as a Christian who revels in the right to express his religious freedom, I chose to pray in that name I always pray in. If I had to do it over again, I probably would not say, ‘All who agree, say Amen.' Additionally, I probably would not say ‘Jesus,' the name that's above all other names. That truly could be interpreted as inflammatory or offensive."

But Caldwell said he always ended his prayers by acknowledging Jesus and will continue to do so. He made an exception once, when praying at a meeting of the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish organization. Graham told the Washington Post days before the ceremony that he would likely end his prayer the way he always does, in church or in public. He said, "I always pray in the name of Jesus Christ. I'm a minister of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's who I am. What I am."

Throughout the campaign, Bush continuously offered a list of platitudes to the American people. He promised to be the "uniter" and that he was an outsider who would bring a bipartisan spirit to Washington. He spoke of fairness and civility and promised to restore dignity to the Oval Office. The emptiness of his promises rung out in his first 100 days.

Once in the White House, Bush tried to continue the lax schedule which he had followed as governor in Texas. But that failed to work. He was forced to stay awake longer, unable to get his usual ample sleep. His banker's hours were left behind in Austin when he left the governor's mansion. And for the first time he could not always rely on a TelePrompTer or a written script.

New York Times reporter Nicholas D. Kristof combed through nearly 1,000 pages of documents pertaining to Bush's daily schedule as governor. Kristof discovered that Bush "works short hours and spends little time studying specific issues or working on executive matters. The schedules show that Mr. Bush typically had his first office meeting about 9 a.m., took two hours of ‘private time' at lunch for a run, and then wrapped up his last meeting by about 5 p.m. A large portion of the officially scheduled meetings were ‘photo opportunities,' interviews with reporters, or meetings with school groups, or other ceremonial occasions." Bush devoted very little time to the issues.

Gail Sheehy described Bush's simple life style in Vanity Fair (October 2000): "Nothing engages Bush's attention for more than an hour, an hour -- more like 10 or 15 minutes." Chief of staff in Texas, Clay Johnson, said that Bush put in "two hard half-days." Johnson added that the governor worked between 8:00 and 11:30 a.m. which was broken up with a series of short meetings that last 15 or 20 minutes. Then at 11:30, Bush was "outtahere." He frequently spent "private time" for about two hours. Some times he would jog five miles at the University of Texas track. He would return to the office at 1:30 and play video golf or computer solitaire until about 3:00, and finally put in some work as governor until 5:30.

As president, Bush tried to present a new image. He gave the impression that he was busy as he hastily moved to introduce new legislation and to address a plethora of groups. He visited an inner-city school, launched his education reforms, attending a largely African-American Sunday church service, stood in front of rainbow coalition of religious personages announcing his creation of a White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, spent time with the Congressional Black Caucus, appeared at the National Prayer Breakfast, and invited himself to speak at the Senate and House Democratic retreats.

Meanwhile, with a stroke of a pen, Bush forged ahead with his conservative agenda. He restricted federal money for overseas reproductive rights initiatives, pushed for Ashcroft's nomination, lobbied for a tax proposal that would benefit the nation's wealthy, assigned oil man Cheney to oversee the energy task force, packed his White House counsels' office with veterans of the Clinton impeachment wars; and spoke of promoting Supreme Court lawyer, Ted Olson, a leading Clinton hunter, to the position of solicitor general.

Bush began his first week by summoning dozens of members of Congress -- Democrats and Republicans to the White House for a dose of his "charm." Like a high school jock, he gave nicknames to legislators, many of whom he did not know. He dubbed Republican Congressman Fred Upton "Freddy Boy" and called Democratic Congressman George Miller "Big George." The goal of the newcomer president to Washington was to cozy up to lawmakers on the other side of the aisle and try to win approval so he could push his proposals through Congress. Bush's leadership style may have helped in Texas, but the young president had an entirely different breed of congressmen on Capitol Hill where the stakes are higher and party lines were much more sharply drawn.

Bush's first objective was to placate the conservative base of the party and then to reach out to centrists. In his first two weeks, he appointed pro-life and anti-desegregation Missourian John Ashcroft as attorney general. He slashed funding to international organizations that counseled mothers on the viability of abortion. He cozied up to faith-based organizations by promising them federal funds to work with troubled youth, and he proposed school vouchers in his education package. In doing so, incorporated religions into the Departments of Justice, Labor, Education, and Health and Human Services.

After honoring the right, Bush appeared to reach out to moderates and even liberals -- what his father had failed to accomplish. He invited nearly half of legislators on Capitol Hill, Republicans and Democrats alike, to the White House. He surprised House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt on his sixtieth birthday, and he hosted several members of the Kennedy clan as they watched the newly released film about the Cuban Missile Crisis.

ABANDONING THE CENTER

Bush campaigned not as an expert on domestic or foreign affairs but as one, so he claimed, would bring Americans from all parties together. He had the opportunity to demonstrate the truth of that claim but reverted to his South Carolina primary rhetoric by catering to the far right. Throughout the 2000 campaign, Bush had argued that the American people needed an "outsider" in the White House and that he was their man. Time and time again, he boasted that "I am a uniter --not a divider." During the primaries, he castigated Senator John McCain for being a "Washington insider." And after the Texas governor was anointed at the GOP convention in Philadelphia, he lashed out at Vice President Al Gore, charging that he was part of the Washington problem and that he could not be trusted. Bush's mantra -- "I am a uniter" -- could be heard daily, as his diatribe continued to Election Day. And after Election Day, the presumptuous Bush tried to give an appearance that he was the president-elect by beginning the process of putting together an administration. However, it was more than a month later that he was officially crowned.

In late November, Bush announced that he would begin planning a transition, naming Dick Cheney to head it, former elder Bush administration official Cheney took center stage and appeared to be making all the calls. It was Cheney who held more press conferences than Bush. It was Cheney who appeared on the "Today" show, on "Larry King Live" and elsewhere. And it was Cheney who was in Texas at the Bush ranch with General Colin Powell.

Bush himself was relegated to his Crawford ranch. He rarely addressed the nation. And when he did, he was flanked by American flags as he read a TelePrompTer or followed a scripted speech pieced together by his advisers. Occasionally he held photo ops where he could be seen playing fetch with his dog Spot, standing by a fence with Colin Powell, sitting with Trent Lott, unloading gear from a utility vehicle.

Bush's aides contended that their man was really calling the shots. They claimed that it was Bush himself who was intimately involved in the transition, making all the key decisions himself but keeping above the fray while the Florida election remains in dispute. The governor's advisers pointed out that Cheney was merely acting as the consummate staff man, implementing the governor's wishes. Cheney had lengthy phone conversations with Bush at least three or four times a day, they said in the New York Times (December 2, 2000).

Bush spokesman Dan Bartlett said in the New York Times, "As Secretary Cheney said himself, Governor Bush is in command and making all the decisions. Governor Bush is conducting himself in a low-key, gracious way." Another adviser, Ed Gillespie, said, "The punditry can speculate and navel-gaze all they want, and the governor doesn't care. He knows that he's doing what he needs to be doing."

The Texas governor also called on other cronies from his father's administration. Andrew Card, the governor's choice for chief of staff, served as Transportation secretary. James Baker III, who served as the senior Bush's secretary of State, was in Florida steering the legal battles. Another former Bush administration official joined the younger Bush's team: David Gribben, who was assistant secretary of Defense in charge of congressional relations under Cheney, was slated as the director of congressional relations for the transition.

Despite Bush's assertion that he was a "Washington outsider" and that he would bring a spirit of bipartisanship to the White House, he was clearly an "insider." He chose former administration officials from his father's staff to step into leading roles in organizing a potential administration, and he immediately faced questions about the extent to which he is his own man, rather than his father's son. Cheney tried to dismiss the notion, saying that it made sense for a Republican potential president to reach out for talent to previous GOP administrations. Quoted in the Los Angeles Times (November 30, 2000), Cheney said, "The fact of the matter is, when you put together an administration, one of the things you look for are people with experience. So the suggestion that we are, quote, over-reliant (on former Bush administration officials), I just don't think holds water."

On the day that Bush resigned as governor, once again he tried to reflect his bipartisan spirit, saying, "I was not elected to serve one party, but to serve one nation. The President of the United States is the President of every single American, of every race and every background." Referring to the Texas House as "a home to bipartisan cooperation," he added, "Republicans and Democrats have worked together to do what is right for the people we represent."

However, Bush advisors privately acknowledged that the governor had to be careful not to draw too heavily on his father's friends. Stephen Hess, a senior fellow with the Brookings Institution who studies presidential transitions, said in the Los Angeles Times, "The first few people out there have the Bush Sr. imprimatur. If only for that reason, I think they're going to be very cautious about what I call my-father's-Oldsmobile syndrome, the idea that this is just Bush Two, or a retread."

Funeralgate resurfaced in early 2000 when it became known that Gonzales was on Bush's "short list" to fill the first available vacancy on the United States Supreme Court. In a document entitled "Motion to Compel Deposition of Alberto Gonzales," lawyers for Eliza May, a former whistleblower who served as executive director of the Texas Funeral Services Commission that regulated the funeral business, sought a court order to require the White House counsel to answer questions in the case. May was subsequently fired and claimed that she was a victim of retaliation.

A memo dated April 22, 1996 -- and uncovered after Bush was elected president -- from the Texas Funeral Services Commission to Bush suggested possible improprieties by two funeral commissioners with ties to Service Corporation International. SCI was a huge Houston-based funeral corporation headed by Robert Waltrip, a longtime friend of the Bush family. May made allegations that Bush's office interfered with a state investigation into SCI's embalming practices after receiving complaints from Waltrip who had contributed $45,000 to Bush's gubernatorial campaigns and more than $100,000 to the elder George Bush's presidential library. The same year that May made the charges, SCI paid the elder Bush a $70,000 honorarium to speak at a national convention of morticians.

Bush and his aides denied the charges and suggested the entire matter was orchestrated by Democratic lawyers. In April 2001, May's attorneys filed a court motion, stating that Gonzales was a "critically important witness in this case." But Gonzales refused to voluntarily agree to a deposition on the grounds that "he claims not to ‘remember' the matter," the lawyers for May write. (The Nation, May 7, 2001) May's lawyers asked Texas state judge John Dietz to order Gonzales to submit to a deposition in Washington on June 9.

In November 2002, the Bush administration announced its intention to privatize thousands of federal jobs in an obvious aggressive campaign to weaken unions. The White House said that as many as 850,000 federal jobs -- nearly half of the nation’s 1.8 million federal civilian jobs – would be cease to fall under the 600,000-member American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal employee union. (Los Angeles Times, November 16, 2002)

The jobs covered a wide range of white- and blue-collar jobs which included many areas: military logistics and support, information technology, data collection, OSHA employees, mapmakers, computer programmers, engineers, landscapers, park-fee collectors, road builders, and lens- and eyeglass-makers,

While the rationale for taking away the civil service protections of the workers within Homeland Security was Bush’s need to control the department during a time of war, another rationale was given for the job privatization: to save money. The White House claimed that such privatization could save “in excess of 30 percent.” The theory was that competitive bidding would force the bureaucracy to lower costs and improve service, or lose jobs to the private sector.

However, others projected that such savings came about when health and retirement benefits were taken away from the workers. Fewer workers were expected to work longer hours for lower wages, and less-qualified workers were employed.

The post-9/11 airport screening scandals were an example of what happened when a few large corporations earned considerable profits by privatizing jobs that should have been federalized. The poorly trained, poorly educated, poorly motivated screeners, many of whom could not even speak English, were in over their heads, but the goal of privatization was to make money for their bosses, not to provide a quality product.

Similarly, Bush’s goal was not to provide a quality product, but to gain a political edge. First, destroying unions destroyed a major base of the Democratic Party. Secondly, rewarding privatizers strengthened the corporate base of the Republican Party, particularly those who contributed to his political campaigns. Thirdly, by eliminating federal jobs, Bush could say he was bringing down the size of government, even though with privatization there was no quid pro quo relationship between smaller government and better job quality.

As far as any savings through privatizing government was concerned, some indicated that if the quality of the privatized work did not go down, the cost of such work went up. That was why low-bidding privatizing companies, knowing they could not meet the job performance criteria could re-adjust their bids after the bidding process to the point where nothing was saved by privatizing. But the money was shifted away from the workers to their bosses, or the initial low bid was kept low, leading to financial and legal difficulties and poorer job quality.

TRENT LOTT’S TRACK RECORD.

1978 - Congressman Lott spearheaded a successful effort to posthumously restore United States citizenship to Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

1979 - Congressman Lott joined a bipartisan group that backed a constitutional amendment to prohibit busing to desegregate public schools. The proposal was rejected by seven votes.

1981 - Lott filed a friend of the court briefing that bob Jones University deserved tax breaks because “racial discrimination does not always violate public policy.”

1983 – Lott voted against Martin Luther King Day. He later told Partisan Magazine, “We have not done it for a lot of other people that have been more deserving.”

- Lott declared that “the spirit of Jefferson Davis lives in the 1984 Republican platform” and later calls the Civil War “the war of Northern aggression.”

1992 – Lott spoke to the pro-racial group, the Council of Conservative Citizens, and declared, “The people in this room stand for the right principles.” (Newsweek, December 23, 2002)

On Strom Thurmond’s 100th birthday in December 2002 GOP Senator Trent Lott -- soon to become majority leader of the upper chamber -- made clear his racist beliefs. He said, “I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years, either.” Lott’s remarks were intended to pay tribute to the South Carolina senator. Lott made the same type of comment on at least two occasions. (New York Times, December 8, 2002)

Thurmond, as governor of South Carolina, ran for the White House as a Dixiecrat, who stood for segregation of the races. “All the laws of Washington and all the bayonets of the Army cannot force the Negro into our homes, our schools, our churches,” Thurmond said during his campaign against Harry Truman and Thomas Dewey -– in which he won four states. (Washington Post, December 10, 2002)

Blasting Lott’s comments, Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. called for the incoming Senate majority leader to quit. “Trent Lott must step down. He is supposed to be Senate majority leader for all Americans, but he once again has shown he is interested only in Confederates.” Then Al Gore accused Lott of making a “racist statement,” saying that the Senate should censor him unless he withdrew the comments.

Days later, Lott delivered a lengthy public apology today for his comments and vowed to “undo the hurt” that he had caused. But he rejected growing calls from Democrats and even conservative commentators for him to relinquish his post as incoming majority leader. Lott appealed repeatedly for “forbearance and forgiveness.” He said, “Segregation is a stain on our nation's soul. There’s no other way to describe it. It represents one of the lowest moments in our nation’s history, and we can never forget that.” (New York Times, December 14, 2002)

Lott said in 1997 that, as a student at the University of Mississippi in 1962, he had “favored segregation.” As a young lawyer making his start in politics in 1967, he stunned a racially moderate friend running governor by campaigning instead for an arch-segregationist rival candidate. (New York Times, December 14, 2002)

The next year, a month after the assassination of the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Lott went to work as a top aide to one of the staunchest segregationists in Congress. He worked for a powerful Mississippi lawmaker who, two journalists said, greeted King’s assassination by grumbling that it would probably bring about passage of a fair housing bill. In 1972, Lott was that Congressman’s hand-picked successor. His first piece of legislation was an anti-busing bill. ,/p>

In 1992, Lott received an award from the Council of Conservative Citizens, a Southern White supremacist group in Carroll County, Mississippi. He addressed its national board in Greenwood, Mississippi in 1992 and drew harsh criticism several times in the 1990s. ,/p>

In 1999, Lott wrote to the Anti-Defamation League that he “could never support -- or seek support from -- a group that disdained or demeaned” people because of their race. “I grew up in a home where you didn’t treat people that way, and you didn’t stand with anyone foolish or cruel enough to do so,” he said.

BILL FRIST. With Bill Frist, a medical doctor, Bush got a “compassionate conservative” who could be a pivotal player in the single biggest issue facing Congress: the soaring cost of health care. Along with the struggling American economy, the health care issue was the most significant factor facing the nation. (Village Voice, January 24, 2003)

Frist’s father, Dr. Thomas Frist, founded the hospital conglomerate HCA, and Tommy Frist, another son, was the former chairman and CEO who continued to serve on the board of directors. In 1994 the business merged with Columbia, creating the nation’s largest hospital network. Bill Frist’s 2001 financial disclosure form put his Columbia/HCA shares at between $15,000 and $50,000, with $5 million to $25 million more in a blind trust whose holdings are unknown.

In 1993, federal investigators swept through 19 HCA offices searching for evidence to document charges of overcharging and fraud. Among the accusations was that the network was paying kickbacks to physicians in the Medicare program. Seven years later, the company pled guilty to 14 felonies. Corporate difficulties were compounded by a suit from whistle-blowers who said they received death threats and were ostracized after going public with the allegations. (Village Voice, January 24, 2003),/p>

In January 2003, the Justice Department unexpectedly announced a settlement, with the company paying $631 million. HCA was to pay another $17.5 million to states claiming HCA overcharged their Medicaid programs.

Frist’s conflicts of interest primarily revolved around a patients’ “bill of rights” -- a measure lobbied for by Columbia/HCA. Sounding like Bush, Frist declared, “I see no conflict of interest as I carry out the nation’s business.”

Frist’s version of the bill provided federal protection for the right to adequate medical care, but it did not help pay for it. What it did was to protect the care providers from legal liability by capping damages, restricting conditions under which suits could be brought, and immunizing employers.

The anti-regulation Frist argued that lawsuits would drive the cost of health care up, pushing more and more Americans into the pool of people not covered by any kind of health insurance. ,/p>

Frist also favored other Bush-style programs, including the creation of IRA-like medical savings accounts complete with tax breaks. On social issues, Frist had a strong conservative record. He opposed abortion, sex education, international family planning, emergency contraception, and fetal tissue research. He led the fight against human cloning. Frist opposed legislation banning job discrimination on the basis of sex and opposed a bill reserving 10 percent of highway contracts for firms owned by women or minorities. (Village Voice, January 24, 2003)