Mountain of Judgment

It's not the 16 words on yellow cake in the State of the Union Address. Neither "Mission Accomplished" nor "Bring it on" did the trick. It's this little seven-word, $200 billion sentence, on Katrina reconstruction:

"It's going to cost whatever it costs."

Can't you just hear the Republican wallets (and testicles) tightening? Sure, Iraq is a sexy money pit; a couple hundred billion down the hole there is chump change, in service of Democracy! Freedom! Pax Americana! But that kind of money pointed even dishonestly in the direction of poor Americans? Ahem, well, the stuff doesn't grow on trees, you know. Of course you and I and Bush realize that the bulk of the proposed flood of cash--just like Iraq--will go straight into the pockets of the GOP's contractor pals and assorted right-wing opportunists. A billion or two may just disappear. Whoops! But George knows he can't come out and say that.

Bush and his boys may be furiously denying the possibility of tax increases, but apparently, a big chunk of Bush's base just read his lips. He's actually down in the polls since his phony FDR/LBJ moment, with a shrinking 63% of Republicans now approving of the administration's handling of the hurricane. When's the last time only 63% of his party backed him on anything? After all the judo this administration has performed, I was skeptical that this disaster would really damage them. But now that they're forced for the first time to risk alienating their base, I really don't see where they go from here, except down.