In an Awkward Dance, the President Is Forced to Follow

I love that headline! LMAO!!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/15/AR2005121502195.html

Nearly five months ago, President Bush issued a formal threat to veto legislation barring torture, and for the past five months he has been trying to find a way to avoid doing just that. The price: giving Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) the upper hand.

Once again the awkward, freighted Bush-McCain relationship with all its history of rivalry and resentment took center stage in American politics yesterday, as the second-place finisher in the 2000 Republican presidential primaries forced the first-place finisher to swallow something he once opposed.

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This is not the first time McCain has forced his will on a reluctant president. In Bush's first term, the senator and his allies pushed Congress to rewrite campaign finance laws in hopes of curbing the influence of big money in politics. Bush, who had not supported the measure, signed it under pressure. Earlier this year, McCain, without White House sanction, led a group of senators on both sides of the aisle in reaching an agreement to confirm some Bush judicial nominees while rejecting others.

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In hindsight, it may have been Vice President Cheney, more than Bush, who provoked the confrontation that led to yesterday's truce. When McCain, a prisoner of war in Vietnam, and other Republican senators proposed outlawing the cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment of detainees, Cheney launched a personal lobbying campaign to block it on the grounds that it could diminish the U.S. campaign against terrorists.

(more at link)