Storm in a port: Where's the cavalry?
Republican insiders are wondering where the cavalry is. They give White House counselor Dan Bartlett an A for effort in his repeated TV interviews this week to make President Bush's case in favor of that controversial seaport deal. Bartlett has emerged the leading White House spokesman on the issue. But the insiders say his effort isn't enough.
"Where is Cheney? Where is Card? Where is Rove?" asks a senior Republican, referring to the vice president, White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card, and Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove. "They don't have the credibility they used to have, so they are lying low. The White House needs more firepower."
And so far, President Bush doesn't seem familiar enough with the specifics to make his case in detail, in the view of many GOP loyalists. They point out that White House officials have admitted that Bush didn't even know about the deal to hire a company controlled by the United Arab Emirates to run six U.S. seaports until the news media reported that other officials in his administration had approved it.
But the storm may blow over soon. Some Republican advisers with close ties to Congress think they see the endgame of the seaport saga. They predict that Bush will, in the end, recognize that he is in what his father used to call "deep doo-doo" and back off his hard-line position on the United Arab Emirates deal. The opposition on Capitol Hill is just too strong for him to follow through on his my-way-or-the-highway attitude, underscored by his angry threat to veto any legislation designed to nix the arrangement, according to the advisers. They predict that Bush will, in the next few days, postpone implementation of the agreement and allow Congress to study it. He will then conduct a full-court press with legislators to defuse the issue by arguing that security won't be jeopardized and that the deal has already been carefully reviewed within the administration.
In the end, he may also agree to require the UAE to adjust the contract to satisfy security concerns or void the arrangement completely and start from scratch, according to this scenario. White House officials, however, claim that Bush isn't ready to give up on the deal and will fight for it indefinitely.
As with the controversy over the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, insiders say Bush today resents anyone raising questions about his effectiveness in protecting national security.
"He's angry that he's being challenged, and it's affecting his judgment again," says a Republican strategist who advised a previous GOP president.