GOP Folds as White House Fights Back

It's not hard to spot the 2008 presidential candidates. Senators Bill Frist and Lindsey Graham clearly want the top job, and aren't above putting the screws to the Bush administration in an attempt to endear themselves to the lefties and the press If anyone is folding in the face of the pressure from the Dems and the press, it's not the president:

In a sign of increasing unease among Congressional Republicans over the war in Iraq, the Senate is to consider on Tuesday a Republican proposal that calls for Iraqi forces to take the lead next year in securing the nation and for the Bush administration to lay out its strategy for ending the war.

The Senate is also scheduled to vote Tuesday on a compromise, announced Monday night, that would allow terror detainees some access to federal courts. The Senate had voted last week to prohibit those being held from challenging their detentions in federal court, despite a Supreme Court ruling to the contrary.

Senator Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican who is the author of the initial plan, said Monday that he had negotiated a compromise that would allow detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to challenge their designation as enemy combatants in federal courts and also allow automatic appeals of any convictions handed down by the military where detainees receive prison terms of 10 years or more or a death sentence.

The proposal on the Iraq war, from Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader, and Senator John W. Warner, Republican of Virginia, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, would require the administration to provide extensive new quarterly reports to Congress on subjects like progress in bringing in other countries to help stabilize Iraq. The other appeals related to Iraq are nonbinding and express the position of the Senate.

Once again, Scott Ott nails the real story behind the GOP plan:

November 15, 2005
Zarqawi Backs GOP Call to Unveil War-Ending Plan
by Scott Ott

(2005-11-15) — Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, today endorsed a measure introduced by Senate Republicans that would force President George Bush to lay out his plan for ending the war against terrorists in Iraq.

“We think it is important for a democracy such as the United States to be transparent with the public,” said Mr. Zarqawi in a video statement released to al-Jazeera TV and CNN. “We’ll all feel better when we learn strategic and tactical details of how Mr. Bush intends to stop al Qaeda from turning Iraq into the first major victory in the global jihad.”

As a show of ‘good faith’ diplomacy, Mr. Zarqawi said he would soon release his own detailed plans for “casting the American infidel and his Zionist conspirators into a lake of burning sulphur.”

Sen. John Warner, R-VA, who sponsored the bill, said Mr. Zarqawi’s backing should help garner votes from Senate Democrats who are typically reluctant to support any Republican measure.

“It’s really a tri-partisan effort,” Sen. Warner said.

Meanwhile, Bush is fighting back with a new TV ad showing the Senate Dems in their pre-war statements and comparing them to today, and the White House will continue to blast back in various press releases.

Ben Franklin once famously said that "if we don't hang together, we will all surely hang separately". Apparently Frist and Graham prefer their own gallows.