Nancy Pelosi's honeymoon is over. Gone are the elegant celebrations of the first female House speaker, the popular bills that sailed through early with bipartisan support, the news conferences touting her victories for the middle class.
The California Democrat faces the first knock-down, drag-out legislative battle of her short tenure as speaker as early as Friday, when she and her leadership team move to push through a closely divided House a $124 billion emergency wartime spending bill. And on the eve of what has been building for weeks as an epic congressional showdown over the increasingly unpopular war in Iraq, she still lacked the votes for victory.
Nearly all Republicans were expected to side with President Bush and oppose the bill, charging that its collection of military readiness conditions, Iraqi benchmarks and waivers amounts to "micromanagement" of the war. And the Republicans may attract the sympathies of a few conservative Democrats.
From the other side, at least a dozen liberal Democrats are attacking the measure for not doing enough to force an end to the war, despite the bill's Aug. 31, 2008, deadline for U.S. withdrawal.
That collection of complaints presents Pelosi with a daunting political calculus. She must persuade at least 218 of the 233 House Democrats to support the legislation, even though many have strong misgivings. It's a risky balancing act that, as of Wednesday, was proving very difficult for Pelosi to pull off, one of her top deputies conceded.
Rep. Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), the Democratic Caucus chairman, said that party leaders still did not have enough votes to pass the measure, but he was confident they would when the bill reaches the floor.
If Pelosi fails to muster the votes, she risks handing the minority Republicans a major victory and suffering a defeat with personal and political reverberations.
What I find interesting about this is all of San Fran Nan's troubles are being generated by her own party. The Republicans have no real power in the House, and even if they show perfect unity, they cannot stop unified Democrats from doing whatever they want. However, Dems are anything but unified by issues related to Iraq and that's what's causing all of the Speaker's distress.
Welcome to leadership, Nancy.
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