Americans disapprove of veto

Most Americans disapprove of President Bush's decision to veto the Iraq Occupation funding bill.

When Bush vetoed the bill on May 1, I noted that he was pulling out all the rhetorical stops to cast congressional Democrats as the bad guys. In his televised address that evening, he blamed them for failing to fund "the troops." He referred to "the troops" fifteen times as direct beneficiaries of the funds that he had vetoed mere moments before. He suggested once again that leaving Iraq would allow "the terrorists" to take over that country. He attempted once again to conflate the people "the troops" are fighting in Iraq with the people who attacked the United States on 9/11.

The speech was pathetic and communicated nothing so much as perplexed desperation. It was obvious that contending with a congress that considers itself a co-equal branch of government has set Bush at his wit's end. The only way he can deal with it is to attempt to demonize the Democratic majority for failing to bow before him as the Republicans have done. I wondered how this attack would play with the public. Now we know. It isn't playing well at all.

A majority of the U.S. public disapproves of President Bush's decision to veto a war spending bill that called for U.S. troops to leave Iraq in 2008, according to a CNN poll released Tuesday.

The poll found that 54 percent of Americans opposed Bush's May 1 veto, while 44 percent backed the president's decision to kill the $124 billion bill.

Now that the veto has been cast, 57 percent of Americans said they want Congress to send another spending bill with a timetable for withdrawal back to the White House, the poll found -- but 61 percent would support a new bill that dropped the timetables in favor of benchmarks for the Iraqi government to meet to maintain American support.

Any way you look at it, the American people are ready for the occupation of Iraq to end. They do not accept the premise that the occupation should be an open-ended endeavor. Bush has always been on the wrong side of history with the invasion of Iraq. Now it is undeniable that he is on the wrong side of public opinion, as well. The congress must continue to insist on a forseeable extrication from this quagmire. It is their duty. Bush can continue to veto the bills, but the congress must never stop sending them to him. Eventually, he will either do the right thing, or he will doom the Republican Party in the 2008 elections, after which a Democratic president backed by an overwhelmingly Democratic congress will bring this tragedy to an overdue conclusion.

The best case scenario, barring Bush's sudden acquisition of a conscience, is that congressional Republicans, in an effort to prevent an electoral slaughter in '08, will join with Democrats to force the president's hand. Let us hope they see the light sooner rather than later. The troops deserve no less.