PORKBUSTERS UPDATE: A new editorial in the Washington Examiner:

If Bush is truly serious about protecting the powers and prerogatives of his office, he will set aside his veto reservations and slam-dunk the emergency funding bill if it comes to his desk in anything remotely resembling the form in which the Senate passed it last week. Bush originally asked for $92 billion to support U.S. troops in Afghanistan and Iraq and to assist with hurricane recovery efforts on the Gulf Coast. The House approved the bill substantially as Bush requested.

Things were completely different in the Senate, where the Old Bulls had a field day larding the measure up with nearly $20 billion worth of special-interest earmarks like $700 million for the “Railroad to Nowhere” in Mississippi. A valiant effort by Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., to remove a dozen of the worst earmarks failed and the thoroughly stuffed final measure was approved by a wide margin. Passage came within days of release of a highly credible survey that said stopping such spending sprees was the public’s top priority.

That is why the conditions could not now be more perfect for a presidential veto. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and 34 other senators vowed to vote to sustain a presidential veto if needed and House Speaker Dennis Hastert declared the $109 billion earmark-stuffed monstrosity “dead on arrival” in the lower chamber. . . .

If Bush fails to deliver his first veto now, it won’t much matter for the rest of his term what he thinks about executive branch powers, because the Old Bulls in Congress will have all the privileges that count.

Read the whole thing — er, especially if you’re President Bush.