HOUSE GOP READIES $17 BILLION IN CUTS

Trying to come up with $1 trillion in spending cuts by 2002, House GOP members won a procedural vote to send $17 billion in housing aid, school and other spending cuts to the floor. The package is expected to win passage Thursday by a similar margin. (The Senate is preparing its own version now.) Today's GOP victory saw its share of rhetorical lobs: Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-Mo.) called the cuts "mean-spirited" and "morally wrong"; House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bob Livingston (R-La.) decried "the same old Chicken Little-ism: the sky is falling, liberals are out of power and what are we going to do, beat our chests and talk about the poor and elderly?" Besides the cuts, the bill contained $5.4 billion in aid for states recently hit by natural disasters, most of it slated for California.