Novak: Bush unable to control Congress

Bob Novak on our cut-taxes-but-keep-on-spending, hawk-over-there-insufferable-pansy-right-here conservative president.

The decline in President Bush's political fortunes fits the cyclic pattern of all presidents except for one constant that troubles Republicans. In nearly 41/2 years, Bush has not progressed in handling Congress. He seems as much at a loss in dealing with the legislative branch as the day he entered the White House.

Bush is the only Republican president since the 1920s to enjoy protracted control of both houses of Congress by his own party. Yet, he seems less able to direct the legislative branch than Republican predecessors who had to handle a Democratic-controlled Congress. With Congress in its lengthy Memorial Day recess, GOP legislators and lobbyists tabulated the scorecard on items large and small.

*The House passed a stem cell research funding bill marked by Bush for his first veto after GOP leaders made a deal with liberals to bring the measure to the floor in return for their votes on the budget.

*The Senate's highway bill exceeds the president's overly generous spending limits, peppered with pork projects earmarked by individual senators.

*Senior Republican senators cut a deal on judicial confirmations that threw overboard at least two of the president's nominees.

*Republican Sen. George Voinovich of Ohio delayed and broke the momentum for confirmation of John Bolton as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

*Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas, preparing a bid for the GOP presidential nomination, has put a hold on the nomination of longtime Bush supporter Julie Finley as ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) because of her abortion activism.

*CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement) ratification is in deep trouble and will need more effort than shown so far by the White House.

*The president's top legislative priority, Social Security reform, is becalmed. What Bush wants cannot pass either chamber of Congress.

And worst of all, it seems like Bush didn't even try. Maybe his father's experience in the White House screwed him up after all.