GOP Arms Its Troops for Medicare Battle : Congress: House leaders have sent lawmakers home with reams of advice on how to deal with volatile issue, blunt Democratic charges.

Having taken the politically risky step of proposing major changes in Medicare, House Republican leaders have launched an extraordinary drive to inoculate their party against charges that they want to gut the health insurance program for the elderly.

Back in their districts for their first extended visits with constituents since the House and Senate approved budgets calling for big savings in Medicare, House Republicans have been armed with reams of advice from their leaders about how to reassure constituents who are unnerved by GOP plans to curb the growth of spending for Medicare.

Before this week’s Memorial Day recess began, GOP leaders distributed detailed handbooks advising House Republicans on how to address the volatile issue with the press and constituents. The leadership game plan includes a five-step media strategy, sample press releases and even computer software for producing a newsletter on the subject of Medicare reform.

“We must get to our senior centers, to our hospitals, to our editorial board rooms and to the living rooms of our districts to let them know that our Medicare efforts in Washington have one goal: to preserve and protect the current program,” the GOP literature says. “If we get to them first with the facts, the lies the Democrats and their allies are spreading will not be as effective as they hope they will be.”

The GOP leadership’s aggressive effort to get that message out during this week’s congressional recess is a measure of how much is at stake for Republicans in the way the debate is shaped. Medicare, like Social Security, is a hugely popular program that many politicians fear to touch. A recent CBS/Wall Street Journal poll found that 42% of those questioned would be less likely to vote for their member of Congress if he or she voted to cut Medicare as part of an effort to reduce the federal budget deficit.

“If we are successful in the Medicare debate, our majority [in Congress] will increase dramatically,” said Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.). “If we are not, it’s going to be a shouting match on Election Day.”

In aggressively taking their case to constituents, Republicans are hoping to avoid the kind of pummeling they suffered earlier this year when Democrats portrayed a GOP welfare bill as a plot to decimate the school lunch program. Republicans argued that their proposal to convert the program into a block grant would still allow spending to grow, but Democrats’ criticism gained wide currency and threw the GOP on the defensive.

Republicans now are working overtime to counter Democratic claims that they want to cut Medicare. The GOP budget would allow Medicare to grow but at a far slower rate than now. Democrats argue that to make the required savings--$282 billion over seven years under the House budget--Republicans will have to raise premiums and other out-of-pocket expenses paid by the elderly.

The partisan bickering represents the failure of GOP efforts to draw President Clinton and the Democrats into the politically sensitive job of revamping Medicare. For weeks, Republicans have been talking about a report that warns that Medicare is in danger of going bankrupt in the year 2002 and arguing that efforts to shore up the program should be bipartisan.

Democrats, however, have argued ceaselessly that Republicans are trying to rein in Medicare to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy. During House debate on the budget, they displayed poster-sized photographs of elderly people who, they claimed, would be victims of GOP policies. Like their Republican counterparts, Democratic leaders have distributed to members packets of material on Medicare, including suggestions for media events and analyses of local effects of GOP budget policies.

Even before the GOP leadership launched its recess campaign, many Republicans had already taken initiatives. Stearns introduced legislation calling for a commission to bail out Medicare and scheduled four town meetings in one day to address the issue.

Rep. Jim Greenwood (R-Pa.) formed a task force of constituents to advise him on Medicare. Rep. Jon D. Fox (R-Pa.), a freshman who was elected with only 49% of the vote, also put out a newsletter devoted to Medicare and set up a 24-hour toll-free hot line on the issue.

In their recess handbook, GOP leaders suggest that lawmakers appoint one staff person to handle Medicare, tour senior centers and conduct “fact-finding” tours of local hospitals.

The handbook says: “Each and every House Republican must take the initiative and go on offense on the issue that the other side thinks is our most vulnerable--Medicare.”