It’s startling to read Bob Novak’s column this morning and realize that it could have been written by Paul Krugman. Novak’s most revealing graf involves a ‘scouting trip’ National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley made to the Hill:
The tone set by Hadley signaled that the White House did not understand that Lugar, in his fateful speech on the Senate floor the night of June 25, was sending a distress signal to Bush that a change in policy can be instituted only by the president and that it is imperative he act now.
That’s funny, because I heard the S.O.S. loud and clear. A quick tally of Republicans that have broken with the President (at least rhetorically) shows the numbers problem that Bush faces.
“When you count up the votes that we’ve lost and the votes we’re likely to lose over the next few weeks, it looks pretty grim,” said one senior official, who, like others involved in the discussions, would not speak on the record about internal White House deliberations.
The following Republicans have indicated that a change of course is needed and that they can’t support the status quo: Gordon Smith, Chuck Hagel, Olympia Snowe, John Warner, Dick Lugar, Pete Domenici, Judd Gregg, and Lamar Alexander. Norm Coleman, Arlen Specter, and Susan Collins have also expressed reservations. If the GOP can’t hold the defections from this group to under ten, they’ll be unable to filibuster any Iraq bills or amendments. But that will be difficult as Lugar and Warner are the most respected GOP Senators on military and foreign affairs.
The Republicans succeeded in the spring, but they may fail over the next three weeks.
Novak concludes his column:
As the first in a succession of Republican senators to be critical of Bush’s Iraq policy, Hagel feared the worst when he returned home to conservative Nebraska for Fourth of July parades. Instead, he was pleasantly surprised by cheers and calls for the troops to be brought home. Perhaps a White House scouting trip into the American heartland might be worthwhile.
The ground has shifted. But we still have the same president.
The official told the paper, “The heart of darkness is the president. Nobody knows what he thinks, even the people who work for him.”
Perhaps they are waiting on an order to ‘exterminate the brutes’.
Apparently Bush/Cheney deems it better to uselessly forge head rather than fall on his/their sword(s). Some people just can’t admit their failures even though thousands will die needlessly before it’s done. What the public and an increasing number of Republicans think is irrelevant when there’s a legacy to protect.
I really wonder if even a trip to the White House by the Republican leadership would sway this President.
Would it surprise anyone at his point if he came right out and declared Congressional dissenters to be “enemies of the state”?
I am really beginning to question if there is anything that will force Bush’s hand and make him capitulate to the demands of the vast majority of the country. With this administration’s vision of executive power, he could well finally decide to formally declare rule by executive fiat. He obviously believes in the unfettered and absolute rule by the Executive Branch. There may be no way, short of physical removal, that we might be extricated from this crisis.
In the end, his father may be the only one who can “talk him down from the ledge”. And I’m not sure that even his words would be heeded by the President.
Nobody knows what he thinks because he doesn’t himself. Isn’t that the prerequisite of one who is subject to being used? It’s all about Cheney.
John McCain will be the next to leave the sinking ship. Even though he owns the “surge.”
The GOP must be terrified, the Scooter Libby commutation was a huge mistake, everyone knows it was cronyism at its worst. Why? In the last week the GOP has tried to resurrect every failed talking point in the deck:
Warren Terrah!(tm), Clinton Was Worse!(tm), Karl Rove Says Iraq’s Not An Issue In The Election(tm), Global Warming Is Hogwash(tm), Executive Privilege For The Win(tm), Do-Nothing Dems In Congress(tm)…
Nobody’s buying it, of course. Not the NY Times, not Pete Dominici, not even Republican voters.
Now they’re even more worried. Oh, and the memorial wall-to-wall day of der fuhrerprinzip/Petreus’s Big Report Calling For Another Friedman Unit is still six weeks off.
That’s what scares them the most. There’s too much clock to eat up.
LORD ALMIGHTY!!!
White House by Conrad.
and
“The horror! The horror!”
Who is this “official”?
Is there ANYONE in this White House who could be reliably expected to have both read Conrad and to tell this kind of trurth?
ANYBODY!!!???
I am hearing the hoofbeats of a Nixonian-sized tragedy on the gallop now.
Bigger, even.
The Rats are getting out of the way as fast as they can scurry.
Here it comes.
Watch.
AG
those hoofbeats you hear might not be the sound you think it is…apocalypse, anyone?
lTMF’sA