When your opponent is shooting themselves in the foot, don't stop them.

Lott Says Bush Aides Undermine Bid to Stay Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) yesterday lashed out at the White House for undermining his campaign to remain Senate Republican leader, as pressure mounted on him to step down. On a day when Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R.I.) became the first Senate Republican explicitly to call for his ouster, Lott struck back at the White House for leaking negative comments about him in recent days. "There seems to be some things that are seeping out [of the White House] that have not been helpful," Lott told reporters in Biloxi, Miss. He also voiced his concerns in a phone call with White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr., Republican sources said. Lott's friends say he is upset at the White House not only for refusing to support him as leader but also for what they regard as behind-the-scene efforts to push him out. Lott, on several occasions in the past two years, has risen to President Bush's defense, most recently in the debate over authorizing the use of force to depose Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

Now Lott gets a sense of what it means to be a friend of the Bushes. They demand loyalty but rarely give it in return. Of course, if the Democrats remain true to their recent nature, they will probably step up to the mike and try to help Bush and Lott come to some kind of reconciliation, "for the good of the nation". Am I cynical or what?