Deficit cracking GOP's solidarity Party-line votes no longer assured

More than a decade after the Republican Revolution, when Newt Gingrich became House speaker on the promise to downsize government, Republicans are facing another revolution.

This one is from within.

When Congress returns next month from its Thanksgiving recess, Republican leaders who have never failed to marshal their forces on big party-line votes face the prospect of defeat on tax cuts and spending restraint -- the core issues that have united the party since President Ronald Reagan and gave them their House majority in 1994.

They have lost some tax and spending votes already, and postponed others because of the specter of losing. After a five-year spending spree on everything from the Iraq war to Medicare, deficits are now jeopardizing the tax cuts that were the centerpiece of President Bush's first term.

A move to preserve tax cuts on capital gains and dividends -- the gemstone of the Bush tax cuts for conservatives -- is in trouble in both the House and the Senate. For the first time since Bush took office, House Democrats are united against tax cuts, and Republican moderates are bucking their party leadership.