Congress Can Do It! Bush Must Be Shocked!

House Republicans joined Democrats yesterday and overrode the Prez’s pork-barrel water projects program. As the New York Times says this morning, "The vote on the water measure was 361 to 54, far more than needed to reject the veto. If the Senate follows suit, it will be the first time Mr. Bush has had a veto overturned." The important moment will be when the Senate overrides President Bush’s veto the first time. In the Senate, there has been an aura of invincibility surrounding our insane leaders. As though it were unthinkable, unheard of, and impossible for Republicans to cross the aisle to rebuke or contradict the fascist regime now controlling the White House. But when the Senate overrides a veto and sees that the sky did not fall in, the dissidents were not murdered in their beds and the world did not end, it will be a monumental day. And from that moment on, overriding vetoes will be, if not a daily occurrence and popular in the US Senate, at least it will be a possible and very probable course of action. When the House quashed Bush’s veto on the water projects measure, it approved a $215 billion bill to pay for health, education, labor and veterans programs despite a veto threat. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), who helps map out the Democrat’s spending strategy, was quoted in the NYT saying: “The president is appealing to a very small conservative base of people, his last few friends in the country, to say, ‘I am conservative’...but the problem is, he is playing with American lives while he sends his message to his friends.” And those few friends have less clout and less political power as each day passes. Bush said he “would not withdraw from Iraq, even if Laura and Barney are the only ones supporting me.” As it turns out, yesterday’s vote shows that the Prez, Laura and Barney are not enough. He is not a dictator and/or king after all.