Andrew Sullivan writes today, among other things:

In retrospect, the president should have clearly said last week that Lott should step aside as SML, which would have sped events up. I can see why he didn't. He doesn't want to interfere with the Senate's business, he said the right thing about the underlying issue, and anything more might have seemed over-kill.

There's another reason, I suspect.

The President has no direct power to remove Lott--that can only be done by his colleagues in the Senate. If he came out and publicly demanded that he step down, and Lott refused to do so, and the Senate refused to remove him, the President would have appeared, in the public perception, to be weak and unable to control events. I don't think that he wanted to risk that, and perhaps he still doesn't.

Problems fall into two general classes; Yours and somebody else's. The President has it straight.

The most dangerous part of Washington is the space between Andrew Sullivan and a TV camera. You can't take anything he says seriously.

It would also be a pretty serious breach of the principle behind separation of powers, surely. Sullivan is probably making the old British mistake of thinking of the President as an old-style Prime Minister here.

Yes, and no. I don't recall which blogger noted that the Senate, in particular, is VERY jealous of its prerogatives, to the point of being willing to "diss" a same-Party President in order to underscore that it is NO ONE's catspaw. If Dubya came out and openly called for Lott's resignation (as SML), how many GOP Senators would line up behind Lott for the simple reason of telling the White House that they don't kow-tow to him?

Worse, imagine if Dubya comes out opposing Lott and Lott doesn't fall?! What does Dubya do then, w/ a Senate Majority Leader he's openly tried to topple and failed? How does that work in terms of Dubya's political strength, his credibility, his vulnerability?