http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/13/polit ... ref=slogin

As prospective Republican presidential candidates search for themes to distinguish their prospective campaigns, and distance themselves from the embattled incumbent in the White House, they appear to be in agreement on what one central issue should be in 2008: Curbing the federal spending that has soared under President Bush.

For two days before an audience of Southern Republicans here, the party's potential candidates for 2008 called for cutting or slowing federal spending across the board and retooling bedrock entitlement programs — Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security — that have become a drain on the federal treasury.

They called for a presidential line-item veto and a balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution. And with varying nuance, they attacked earmarking, the budget tactic some members of Congress use to channel money to favorite projects, outside scrutiny of the normal budget process.

"Yes, these last five years, we've been hit with unexpected challenges: a recession, 9/11, homeland security, the war on terror, Katrina," said Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, the majority leader, who is preparing to run in 2008. "But they're not justification for a one-way ticket down a wayward path of wasteful Washington spending."

Senator John McCain of Arizona, another likely candidate, declared: "We need to pass a line-item veto. But we also should have the willpower to stop this. We have to stop this."

These attacks on the size of government, and the barely implicit criticisms of how Mr. Bush watched the books these past six years, are a direct appeal to fiscal conservatives who have long been distressed about the growth of spending under Mr. Bush and who are central to the party's presidential nominating process.

But the issue, if politically potent and revealing of what kind of policies these men might pursue in the White House, is not without risks, particularly for the four United States senators who are thinking of running. Unlike the two soon-to-be-ex-governors who are considering a run for president, these four senators face real-life tests of their commitment to attacking federal spending, and in the case of Mr. Frist, the ability to deliver a budget resolution that is acceptable to conservatives.

Not surprisingly, none of the potential candidates who talked about cutting spending to 2,000 Republicans at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference here offered much idea about what actually could be cut.

But back in Washington, where a new budget season has arrived, these senators are likely to find themselves voting on spending restraints in the months ahead that, if popular to this audience, may be politically problematic with a wider audience. Conservatives are pushing, for example, a budget proposal that would produce $650 billion in savings during the next five years, with much of the money coming out of Medicare and Medicaid.

As it is, a budget resolution due to come to the floor of the Senate this week has been stripped of cuts in Medicare that had been pressed by the White House, a reflection of the conclusion by Congressional leaders that they could not get enough votes to pass such a bill.

Indeed, last year, in a sign of just how hard it is to make any kind of cuts in spending, Republicans turned to Vice President Dick Cheney to break a tie in the Senate to enact a net $39 billion in cuts.

And Republicans are divided over whether earmarking should be eliminated, restricted or simply changed so that the process is open to easy public scrutiny. Mr. Frist's choice of words in talking about this issue, in the midst of calling for cutting the size of government and reducing entitlement spending, was revealing: "No more hidden earmarks," he said.

The other complication is the White House itself. The likely presidential candidates left little doubt about what at least some of them saw as Mr. Bush's complicity in the spending increases that took place during the first six years of his term. "Our discretionary spending — taking out Iraq and mandatory spending — grew 49 percent in four years," said Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, a likely presidential candidate.

But they are not alone in seeing political benefit in returning to the spending issue.

A Republican close to the White House, who insisted on anonymity in exchange for talking about private discussions, said that Mr. Bush's own menu of spending restraints, along with his call for Congress to pass a line-item veto, reflects in part a political decision to embrace this issue to steady his presidency, and to build his standing with the party's conservative base.

Mr. Bush's emphasis on the issue may also reflect an effort by the White House to help Congressional Republicans. Some of them fear that the party's base, which is upset over the growth of government even with Republicans in control of the White House and Congress, may fail to turn out in sufficient numbers to counter an energized Democratic party this November.

There are ways to talk about reducing the size of government without taking political risks. Senator George Allen of Virginia spoke just as enthusiastically about a line-item veto, along with a balanced-budget amendment, as he did about spending curbs.

Yet that may not be enough in this environment, given the extent that the federal budget is out of balance and the distress by conservatives over how Republicans have managed the government.

Spending has been one issue on which some of Mr. Bush's most prominent supporters, among them Grover G. Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, have openly broken with the White House. But there could be no doubt about the power of this issue after the weekend in Memphis.

One of the most striking moments involved a speech not by a possible presidential candidate, but by Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. Mr. Graham stood up, speaking softly but urgently, and apologized to the audience for what had happened with spending in this era of Republican rule in Washington.

"I am sorry for letting you down when it comes to spending your money," Mr. Graham said. "We're going to turn it around; if we don't, we're going to be in trouble."

The audience was silent for a second, and then burst into applause. It was a moment that no doubt did not escape notice of any Republican thinking of running for president in 2008 who was anywhere near that room.