So, bu$h Gets Patriot Act Renewal & Port Deal, Even With His POlls In The

[Dinger]

What gives? What fucking gives?? It looks like there are only 4 senators who have balls.

[MichiganVote]

1. What gives is Congress is as useless as he is

[RufusEarl]

2. That what happens with NO oversight!

[OldLeftieLawyer]

3. My worst fears

The whole country - with the exception of DU - has rolled over, flashed its fleshy underbelly, and offered up its throat.

[newscott]

5. Take a good sniff

that belly has gone bang in the mid day sun.

[RazzleDazzle]

4. Guess he's right about that political capital

after all

[windy252]

6. My cynical self says

the only reason Congress isn't doing its job is because he doesn't have a D after his name.

[Xeric]

7. the polls don't show the whole truth

What people don't seem to understand is that Bush is down in the polls for more than one reason. Not just that he has alienated substantial numbers of moderates (he alienated those of us on the left a long time ago). He's also now alienated many on the right. Why? Because he hasn't been extremist enough for them. The large native fascist base of the Republicans are not that happy with the lack of a "win" in Iraq (the nuke'em crowd) or that he has played them for suckers by not really cracking down on "illegal" immigration.
My guess is that the country is still divided 50 50. The unhappiness with Bush cannot be assumed to be a positive for Democrats. It will take a lot of finesse and some serious education of the electorate to translate into a win for Democrats in November. I am not that optimistic, as Democrats can't seem to exploit the situation due to their (partly correct) fear that taking a stance against the war will not translate into votes and the fact that they are undergunned in the mainstream media dept.
Hence the constant playing to the middle by them as a safety move.
Waiting for the other guy to make a mistake doesn't win basketball games or elections.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

8. Don't forget * blowing off FISA

The GOP wants to rewrite the law so what * did won't be illegal now and thus, they'll argue, it wasn't illegal then. It won't even cross their minds that this would conflict with Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution: "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed."

Actually, the prohibition involved making an act illegal that had been legal at the time it was done; I bet the Founding Fathers would be shocked to see crimes become non-crimes after the fact.

Like they say, "Do a crime, do the time -- unless you're a Republican."

[Independent_Liberal]

11. Yep, that's the Republicans, thinking the rules don't apply to them.

They want to be dictators and rule everybody.

[glitch]

9. Perhaps he's blackmailing Congress with another MIHOP.

I believe that's how protection rackets work, right?

They're into every other kind of racket, fraud and con scheme, why would they stop at protection racket? Either that or Congress is as proto-fascist as he is, and I am not ready to believe that just yet.

[zeemike]

10. I think you have the right idea

It is all about getting re-elected. And if the Democrats see that the rethugs do indeed have the power to manipulate the vote and steel it at will, then in order to keep their position they know not to cross an invisible line.
Making too big a deal out of the port deal is one of those invisible lines, and that is why there is relative silence on the matter, and why the deal will go through without anything but a few words.