House pressured to pass stripped-down war measure

House pressured to pass stripped-down war measure


By ANDREW TAYLOR, Associated Press Writer Andrew Taylor, Associated Press Writer – Fri Jul 23, 6:36 am ET
WASHINGTON – After a take-it-or-leave-it vote by the Senate, House Democrats face little choice but to drop more than $20 billion in domestic spending from a must-pass bill funding President Barack Obama's troop surge in Afghanistan.

The Senate rejected the House measure, passed earlier this month, by a 46-51 vote that fell short of a majority, much less the 60 votes required to defeat a filibuster.

Instead, the Senate Thursday stripped out the $20 billion in House add-ons and returned to the House an almost $60 billion measure passed by a bipartisan vote in May. The Senate measure is limited chiefly at war funding, foreign aid, medical care for Vietnam War veterans exposed to Agent Orange, and replenishing almost empty disaster aid accounts.

Eleven Senate Democrats and Independent Joe Lieberman of Connecticut voted against the House version of the bill. Not a single Republican supported it.

The moves repel a long-shot bid by House Democrats earlier this month to resurrect their faltering jobs agenda with $10 billion in grants to school districts to avoid teacher layoffs, $5 billion for Pell Grants to low-income college students, $1 billion for a summer jobs program and $700 million to improve security along the U.S.-Mexico border.

The House bill fell to a 46-51 tally that was short of a simple majority, much less the 60 votes required to defeat a filibuster. The Senate is instead insisting on its almost $60 billion version of the measure, passed on a bipartisan vote in May.

The Senate measure is likely to be grudgingly accepted by House Democrats next week despite opposition by many liberals to the war in Afghanistan, which many of them view as unwinnable.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has been agitating for the money and warned lawmakers this week that unless the measure is enacted into law before Congress leaves for its August recess, the Pentagon could have to furlough thousands of employees.

The House bill also attracted a White House veto threat over $800 million in cuts to education programs to help pay for the additional domestic spending under a "pay-as-you-go" culture that the administration itself advocates.

The Senate measure blends about $30 billion for Obama's 30,000-troop surge in Afghanistan with more than $5 billion to replenish disaster aid accounts, as well as funding for Haitian earthquake relief, and a down payment on aid to flood-drenched Tennessee and Rhode Island.

The war funding would bring the amount of money appropriated for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan above $1 trillion.

The measure contains $13 billion in benefits for Vietnam War veterans exposed to Agent Orange, but does not provide more than $4 billion requested by the administration to finance settlements of long-standing lawsuits against the government, including $1.2 billion to remedy discrimination by the Agriculture Department against black farmers and $3.4 billion for mismanaging Indian trust funds.

The measure contains $1.1 billion for mine-resistant vehicles, $657 million for military bases in Afghanistan and $6.2 billion in foreign aid for Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Haiti.

the war must go on

Stop foreign aid. Time to stop paying people to be our friends.

How much we gonna give Pakistan ?

jeez, where'd she find that chunk of money ? are we broke or not ?

India's feelings are a little hurt now....grrreaaat

Joebert wrote:

Stop foreign aid. Time to stop paying people to be our friends.

we don't need no stinking friends

c/thru wrote:

How much we gonna give Pakistan ?

jeez, where'd she find that chunk of money ? are we broke or not ?

India's feelings are a little hurt now....grrreaaat

it' your man obama

nuh-uh...it's Hillary's big idea

c/thru wrote:

nuh-uh...it's Hillary's big idea

who hired her?


leave it to a woman

KK wrote:

Joebert wrote:

Stop foreign aid. Time to stop paying people to be our friends.

we don't need no stinking friends

II ddon't think we should have to pay people to be our friends. We paid Iraq in weapons to fight Russia and look where that got us. Cut the Forign aid, the only troops you see are the ones from the US, UK etc. So if they want aid satand up with us. Don't want to, cut them off.

Joebert wrote:

KK wrote:

Joebert wrote:

Stop foreign aid. Time to stop paying people to be our friends.

we don't need no stinking friends

II ddon't think we should have to pay people to be our friends. We paid Iraq in weapons to fight Russia and look where that got us. Cut the Forign aid, the only troops you see are the ones from the US, UK etc. So if they want aid satand up with us. Don't want to, cut them off.

we need to focus on the USA first.