Influential congresswoman faults Bush on Iran

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/theworld/2005/December/theworld_December477.xml§ion=theworld&col=

WASHINGTON - An influential Republican congresswoman expressed frustration on Friday over President George W. Bush’s approach to Iran and said pressure is building for a tougher US policy.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, a Bush loyalist who chairs a House of Representatives subcommittee on the Middle East and Central Asia, also endorsed a stricter line toward Russia for failing to crack down on Teheran.

“I love President Bush and I support him, but on the issue of Iran, I take great exception to what they have been doing,” she said in an interview with Reuters.

“There is a growing restlessness at a bipartisan level in the House to get tougher on Iran and I think that that’s going to build up even more” when lawmakers are in the home districts in the next two weeks for the holidays, said Ros-Lehtinen, who wants to be the next chair of the House of Representatives International Relations Committee. The panel’s current chairman, Illinois Republican Rep. Henry Hyde, is retiring.

[Spinzonner]

1. She doesn't like the policy

of "My way or the highway"