Andy Card was on Charlie Rose last night and specifically mentioned Grassley as being critical to the SS privatization process. He was quite complimentary of Grassley, who as chairman of the Sentate Finance Committee is not only in a key position to hammer out policy, but he's also the bow of the ship in terms of slicing through the political waters.

Subtext here may be Grassley's exposure on Medicare, given that he played the front man for the prescription drug benefit debacle. He's also a true conservative, not a neocon, and actually cares about small government and balancing the budget (not withstanding the aforementioned Medicare time bomb). Grassley has taken on both the FBI/CIA cartel and the Pentagon in his history, and bloodied both of those power centers.

There's no question that the White House will try to get Grassley back in line, but the real curiosity now is whether the conservatives feel like they can break with the evangelicals (Frist, etc.) now. If that's the case, Bush is dead meat for the rest of his term.

Bush and the White House have failed to line up bipartisan support.

Actually, they've even failed to line up substantial partisan support. A couple of congressmen went turncoat on their constituents, but most ran away and hid. Case in point--New Mexico and Michigan.

I'm still worried about the next three years. GWB has shown he's like a small child; he's never satified 'til he gets his way, just one tantrum after another. Watch him hold his breath 'til he turns blue every session of Congress and during the intersessions as well.

The question I have is weather the Terri situation was a distration to prevent senate democrats from driving the steak through Bush's privitazation plan, which seemed eminate. Perhaps Bush has bought himself some time, but I think the bill is dead either way.

Jim: "Watch him (Bushh) hold his breath 'til he turns blue every session of Congress and during the intersessions as well."

To carry your analogy a little further, if we can help him hold it long enough, perhaps he will suffocate himself (at least politically).

Jonathan.

Schiavo cost the idiot son and neo-cons dearly. They are now way off message and look like a pack of raving lunatics to the majority of the country. For four years it's been like watching a horror movie with the admin as the creature and the population as the ingenue. We've been yelling, "Lookout!" But the ingenue had to get bitten by the creature before she knew it was dangerous. Or in this instance, stupid.

My safe-seat Repub congressperson sent out an e-mail newsletter a couple of weeks ago. Social Security wasn't even mentioned. How does Bush expect to get anywhere if his own guys don't want to talk about it...one & a half years before election day?

David Vitter, the R replacement for John Breaux in the senate, was on local TV news tonight saying that congressional intervention in the Schiavo case was the responsible thing to do. His most frequently shown ad during the campaign was in favor of re-importing drugs from Canada: he'll no doubt toe the party line on that now that he's in office.

Kathryn Harris has been told by Bush and Rove to forget about running for the Senate. Evidently, they don't want the stench from the Florida election to rise again.

Hey Kathryn, that's your thanks for helping steal the election.

philipides is right: Social Security privatization has been derailed and they only have themselves to blame.

One other point worth mentioning is that Shrub has lied so often, there is no reason to trust anyone in his administration.

Well, if Social Security privatization fails, then the next thing coming is raising the retirement age.