Increasingly Embattled, Delay Scales Back Power Plays

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

In the euphemism favored on Capitol Hill, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay is "not staff driven." Translation: He is used to doing what he wants.


It happens all the time, DeLay friends and advisers say. An aide will suggest that the leader soften his tone, or back off just a bit from some inflammatory position. As often as not, the Texas Republican will respond with a snort, suggesting that the adviser is more worried about how a decision will play inside the Beltway than how it will be perceived -- if it is noticed at all -- by the rest of the country.


For a full decade, the 58-year-old DeLay's career has prospered because he was usually right in this calculation, say legislators from both parties who have watched him in action. DeLay could be himself -- a partisan with a zeal for ideological combat, a taste for high living and intense religious conviction -- in ways that made him exceptionally powerful in Congress but not especially recognizable to the public beyond.


Suddenly, the old Texas brio that carried him through years of smaller controversies is on the wane. The leader recognizes -- belatedly, some GOP colleagues say -- that the latest questions about his relationships with lobbyists are a problem threatening his career and the GOP majority he helped to build and sustain since coming to the House 20 years ago. Everywhere there are signs of a politician in retreat.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/08/AR2005050800835.html

[Roland99]

1. It's that new humility he just found.

[Skidmore]

2. Yeah, this was kicked off this weekend by Paula Zahn

who ran a warm and fuzzy piece about Delay narrated by Candy Crowley. Candy gave "Hot Tub Tom" a very wet, sloppy tush smooch.

[Atman]

3. Good.

"DeLay friends do not dispute these observations, agreeing that the personal toll is becoming increasingly obvious. "He's withdrawn, he's tired, he looks like he's not sleeping," said a Republican aide who has worked closely with DeLay..."

Good, Tom. It is time you know how those people feel who fall victim to your mean-spirited, hate-filled politics.

[cally]

4. kick

:kick: