A Faux Showdown

Is President Bush really going to have a showdown with Congress over the budget? Maybe. Congress is supposed to pass its appropriations bills by October 1 but so far they've only moved one of them and Bush's OMB Director nominee, Jim Nussle, is echoing the president's pledge to veto bills that go over his spending cap. But the difference between what the Congress is talking and what the President is saying is only $23 billion in discretionary spending, a small percentage of the nearly $1 trillion that's at issue. (The rest is non discretionary spending on things like Social Security.) After not giving a fig about the deficit for so long, and promoting huge expansions in entitlements like the Medicare Prescription drug plan, it's hard to see how Bush can get all sanctimonious about a few billion here and there. The posturing as a born again fiscal conser vative doesn't make sense, unless of course you think politically. Cutting back on spending is one of the few issues that Bush can use to rally his base and begin the long climb back to respectable poll numbers. Indeed, I'm surprised that John McCain won't cool it about Iraq and go back to one of his great standbys--taking on government pork, an issue on which he has credibility and which would play great in New Hampshire. I suspect that in time, he will. Bush is also likely to see the political benefits of a fight.