Bush the 'Commander Guy' Rejects Spending on His Own War

This week, with an almost totally incoherent speech in which he anointed himself the "Commander Guy" and once again tried to link the ongoing occupation of Iraq to al Qaeda, George W. Bush vetoed more than $100 billion in funds for the war he chose to start and now refuses to end.

Congressional Democrats had sent Bush a compromise spending bill that would have set a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq by the end of next year, but one with enough loopholes built into it that could have driven a Humvee through it all the way to Baghdad. The deadline for withdrawal was actually a "goal," and there were exceptions for troops that were training Iraqis, protecting U.S. facilities and conducting "targeted counter-terrorism missions."

But even that tepid compromise measure was too much for Bush, who insists that Congress should have little or no role in shaping Iraq policy. Bush also objected to $20 billion in funds -- characterized as useless "pork" by Congressional Republicans -- that included money for Veterans' hospitals, for reimbursing states for ongoing healthcare costs and for reconstruction projects in areas still suffering from the after-effects of Hurricane Katrina.

But even as Bush fought this latest battle to a stalemate, his veto helped opponents of the war in Congress achieve something that they could only have dreamed of a few months ago: It created what will now be an unmovable narrative that Bush wants to stay in Iraq, and Congress, led by the Democrats, wants to leave. Regardless of whether that's a true statement, it's certainly simplified. That's the view that emerged from this fight, and is now all but irreversible in the public's mind. That means that congressional Republicans continue to choose between their own chances at reelection and supporting a president with a 30 percent approval rate as he prosecutes a war that the public has clearly rejected. The strategy all along has been to unify Democrats, divide Republicans -- with pressure on the most vulnerable among them -- and isolate Bush. So far, it's been very successful.

But a key question will be answered in the following days and weeks: Did congressional Democrats become so accustomed to losing during their long years out of power that they've forgotten how to win? There's no question that they have the wind at their backs. Dozens of protests against the veto took place across the country on Wednesday, from Jackson, Miss., to Portland, Maine. A CNN poll found that 66 percent of Americans opposed the occupation, and six in ten "said they backed Congress in its standoff with the White House." More than half of those who responded to a Pew poll this week said that Democrats should "insist" on a deadline for withdrawal, while only a third wanted their representatives to oppose it.

The congressional leadership's next move will reveal whether they've fully internalized how deeply unpopular Bush and the occupation of Iraq really are. They have three choices. They can capitulate and send Bush a "clean" spending bill with no timetable for withdrawal. This would be a disaster all the way around; not only would it continue a bloody and immoral war, it would also reinforce the idea that Democrats are weak on an issue where the public is squarely in their corner. Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., who has been way ahead of most of his colleagues on the issue, said of that option: "It's not going to cut it anymore." Liberal Dems in the Congress, many of whom held their noses to vote for the supplemental in the first place, would almost certainly reject surrendering to Bush at this point.

The second option, favored by Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., is to give Bush a clean but short-term funding bill -- one that will only cover two months of the occupation at a time -- and then make the White House come back to Congress for another round, at which point the "surge" will have proven futile and a binding withdrawal resolution will have a better shot at getting enough votes to override a second veto.