Democrats Afraid of Bush?

That is the theory of Matt Stoller at MyDD, with regard to the lack of a timetable in the war supplemental funding bill:

Bush has the bully pulpit. Obviously it's a good move.

These are the attitudes of Democratic members and pollsters. There's no evidence that Bush moves numbers anymore. In fact, when he talks he becomes less popular. He has no credibility, which means that his access to the bully pulpit is severely diminished. Yet Democrats are afraid of him.

Actually, I don't think that the Democrats are afraid of President Bush, I think they are afraid of Americans.

Putting a timetable on the funding bill is widely seen as cowardice, a lack of conviction to use the Constitutional methods available, i.e. actually not funding the war, in favor of trying to tie the President's hands.

Stoller continues:

And while the news media is abuzz with talk of Democratic capitulation, I'm watching idiots like Louise Slaughter on C-Span saying that this is not a concession to Bush, and that Congress is fighting to end the war. And she really believes it. She really thinks that Democrats are fighting Bush with this bill. It's amazing. It's like la-la land.

snip

The key take-away here is that the Democratic Party is degraded and disorganized, and it shows. It's not just that the party is bought off, though some members are. It's that even the ones who want to do the right thing are constantly being told by people like Yang that capitulating to the President is obviously the right move, and that their concession is not actually a concession.

Given their performance on the war funding issue and their complete inaction on any other substantive legislation, Stoller's characterization of degraded and disorganized is pretty charitable.

Greg Sargent has more in a similar vein:

Oooooooooooooo, scary! If we didn't give Bush his way, the White House would have criticized us!

Seriously, the Times account dovetails with what we've heard from multiple Dem staffers. And it has to be said that this is, like, soooooooooo June 2006. Recall that last spring many Dems were terrified of taking on the GOP and the White House over Iraq because they worried that the Republicans would tell the electorate an irresistable story: Dems are weak, and Republicans are strong. When Dems finally realized that Republicans would tell this story no matter what they did, they started telling the story their way: The war in Iraq is a disaster; it has made us weaker; Dems want to end it, and Republicans don't. The rest is history. Dems won the argument.

Now Dems appear to have let their own worries about the potential story that Republicans will tell -- Dems are on vacation while the troops are wanting! -- largely shape their course of action here. Sure, you want to game out what the opposition will do. But Dems, Republicans are going to keep telling the story this way no matter what you do. Indeed, the President just reminded everyone at today's presser that some Dems didn't want to support the troops -- even though the Dem leadership has already agreed to give him his no-timelines funding. Why not start by deciding what the right policy is, and then tell your story as forcefully as you can? Dems can win arguments, as 2006 showed.

It's like the majority party is still stuck in the mindset of being the minority party. Talk about identiy crises.