Weak president losing hold over party

Boy, it's clear that GOoPer congresscritters are reading the same polls we are.

The U.S. Senate defied a second White House veto threat in as many weeks on Tuesday as Republicans displayed a willingness to break ranks with an embattled President Bush on selected fronts.

With Bush's poll numbers slipping as he remains under fire for Iraq and the ailing U.S. economy, Republicans have helped give Democrats a string of recent victories on matters from student aid to federal pay.

On Tuesday, a dozen Republicans sided with 42 Democrats and one independent in voting in the 100-member Senate to repeal new regulations backed by the White House that would allow large media conglomerates to grow even bigger.

Last week, six Senate Republicans joined 47 Democrats and one independent in voting to block administration rules that foes say would deny overtime pay to millions of Americans.

The Republican-led House of Representatives also recently voted, over White House objections, in favor of importing less expensive drugs from Canada and other countries. And it backed a bigger pay raise for federal workers than Bush favored while the Republican-led Senate opposed administration changes that critics say would deny federal aid to thousands of students.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota savored the most recent victory, saying, "I think there's a growing lack of confidence in this administration's ability to lead, ability in Iraq, ability in the economy, ability on fiscal policy."

Hard to believe, but Bush has yet to wield the veto during his presidency. Time to see if he has the cojones to use it. It would be an admission of failure and weakness, considering he has control over the entire governmental apparatus.

Posted September 16, 2003 12:42 PM | Comments (80)