If Bush and the GOPers in Congress are having issues, now is the time to exploit them. Keep up the pressure. They might fight among themselves, but it won't last long. They deserve each other -- and those weak-kneed Republicans on the Hill will never stray too far from Bush. Bottom line is their failures are mutual failures:
Though the tensions were somewhat defused Sunday when the company agreed to a 45-day national security review, the problem continues to exact a steep political price from Mr. Bush, exposing divisions between the White House and Congressional Republicans in a critical election year and further weakening a president already reeling from a series of setbacks, from Hurricane Katrina to the war in Iraq.Thanks to Bush's failures in Iraq, with Katrina and now on port security, the GOP has lost their edge on national security. The Republicans on the Hill know they've got nothing else for the election year. Nothing. But, they'll stick with Bush in the long run. They always do.
"We've defended them on wiretaps, we've defended them on Iraq, we've defended them on so many things he's tried to accomplish, that to be left out here supporting this thing in a vacuum is kind of offensive," Representative Mark Foley, Republican of Florida, said Sunday in an interview after the company's agreement to the review was announced. He added, "If it's just about saving face and letting us humor ourselves, we won't be satisfied."
Sunday's agreement is likely to forestall, at least for the time being, a confrontation between Congress and the president over legislation, which Mr. Bush threatened to veto, blocking the Dubai contract. But with Republicans worried about their own re-election prospects, relations are clearly strained.
