Bush Faces New Skepticism From Republicans on Hill

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A42895-2005Jan27.html?sub=AR

Bush Faces New Skepticism From Republicans on Hill

By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 28, 2005; Page A01


WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W.Va., Jan. 27 -- When President Bush flies to this Allegheny mountain resort Friday to meet congressional Republicans, he will encounter a party far less malleable and willing to follow his lead than it has been for the past four years.

Bush is accustomed to getting his way with Congress and finished his first term without suffering a major defeat. But mid-level and rank-and-file Republicans have begun to assert themselves on issues including intelligence reform, immigration and a major restructuring of Social Security, the centerpiece of his second-term agenda.

Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas (R-Calif.), who has offered a variety of Social Security ideas that differ from the president's, assured Bush at a meeting Wednesday in the White House residence that he is still fighting on his side.

"I've just opened up a new front," Thomas added, according to a participant.

Such independence was much rarer when the party's prospects for keeping control of Congress were tied to Bush's political health, and his reelection was everyone's priority. But now that Bush has run his last campaign, he is being bolder in calling for legislative action than many lawmakers who must run every two years are willing to be.

That leaves the success of his second-term agenda very much in doubt.<snip>

" WE THE PEOPLE' who pay their wages.

They know Bush does not have to run again but they do. They will be very careful with some of his agenda.

and get them to listen to us???

The Imperial Party will give us a show. They have to, to continue to hide the fact that we no longer live in a Constitutional Republic but are rapidly transforming into a BushPutinist State.

Especially now that we are a One -Party State, such shams will have to played played out mroe frequently by the Busheviks with themselves (and the handful of actual real opposition like Ron Paul).

Bullshit. I call bullshit.

I agree that at final vote Delay will snap the whip and they will all be on there knees -

It is like watching a corporate managers staff meeting.