OK Harry, you've gotten Junior's attention, or at least part of it, now what are you going to do with it?

The Dems have a choice, they can get a funding bill passed with some meaningful controls, or they can write what is essentially a bill that give Junior a blank check and surround it with meaningless suggestions.

I know you're dealing with an interesting problem, i.e. a President who can't take advice for the simple reason that it's advice and accepting it would make him think that he looks weak. He's "The Deciderer" after all. You need to find something that is the legislative equivalent of a two-by-four and smack him upside the head with it. You can't get a bill into law without his signature (forget ever getting an override), but he can't get the money without legislation.

How about letting him know that you won't consider any further funding without a draft?

I think that the reason that the override vote picked up four more votes than the original was that the override was essentially a cosmetic vote.

Now those four can tell their constituents that they voted for the bill during the '08 campaign, but not actually worry about that vote having any effect as they knew that the Senate is not taking up the override.

Am I cynical? Good golly yes! But nowhere near as cynical as those four.

"I think it -- I'm just envisioning what it would be like to be a young soldier in the middle of Iraq and realizing that politicians have all of the sudden made military determinations. And in my judgment, that would put a kid in harm's way, more so than he or she already is."

Obviously the report of irony's death, like those of Mark Twain, were somewhat premature. Last time I looked Junior was a politician. Not only that, he's a "Warshington" politician. I guess he still believes the canard about a person being more likely to be killed in LA than in Baghdad.

At this point it's become blindingly obvious that he's just tryiing run out the clock, desperately hoping that somebody, anybody, else will get tagged with blame for the mess that he's created. After all, it's a strategy that worked for him all his life.

The House has already scheduled an override vote, the Senate should do the same. While I don't believe that the overrides will pass, it will be the equivalent of asking those who voted against the appropriation "Are you really sure?". I suspect that this will make the vote closer than one might think as those who voted against the original bill look at their chances in November 2008.

Is this a political ploy? Sure it is. But then the reason we're in Iraq is because Junior and the rest of the Republicans were looking for an issue back before the 2002 elections that could be used to make the Democrats look soft on "Terrism". The entire war is a political ploy gotten out of control.

It would only be fitting for the Dems to schedule the override vote, have it fail, then send up a straight bill, without any guidelines or other extrraneous clauses and announce that the bill is being passed in the face of Dim Son's obstinance and willingness to let the troops twist in the wind rather than accept responsibility for his war of choice or to accept any measure of performance while the situation continues to deteriorate.

The Congress should then get on to other tasks, such as health care, education, global warming, or continuing to provide a window into the operations of an uttrely corrupt Administration via its investigations that also need attention.

Would it be worth pointing out to Anonymous that selfishness knows no age limits? Quite right, there are lots of selfish Boomers around, but there are an awful lot who are still trying to live up to the values that they espoused in the the '60s (now just a bit lighter on the sex 'n drugs 'n rock & roll, though). At the same time, I haven't noticed any shortage of self-absorbed snot nosed young twerps who aren't really experienced enough to be trusted to cross the street by themselves, but are sure they've got the world sussed. Nor is there a shortage of earnest kids in their teens and twenties who are trying to get it right and make a contribution.

I don't think that it's ever too late to see the error of your ways, and if it takes a disaster the size of Dim Son to wake people up, well I guess it's an ill wind that blows absolutely no good. Besides, if being wrongs damns you for all time, why bother to change?

Junior and his handlers no doubt think that the Gonzales flap is a usefull sideshow. As long as we're paying attention to Gonzo, L'il Georgie isn't getting personally fried and serves as a wonderful distraction from the failure of his "surge" in Iraq, the fact that the dollar is in the tank versus virtually any hard currency, and that one of Reagan's advisors just pointed out that he's bankrupting the US economy by sticking with Reaganomics after any possible value it may ever have had is gone.

Having Gonzales resign would provide the masses with one less distraction. The Senate investigation will continue, but Bush can put up a wall of executive privelege litigation more than thick enough to get him past January, 2009.

Yeah, other Republicans will take it the neck for this in November, 2008, but I doubt that Bush sees that as his problem.