Mar 29 2007
Let the posturing begin…
Via Washington Post:
The Senate today defied a White House veto threat and narrowly approved a $122 billion war spending bill that calls for combat troops to begin withdrawing from Iraq this summer.
The 51-47 vote fell mostly along party lines, with two Republicans — Sens. Chuck Hagel (Neb.) and Gordon Smith (Ore.) — joining Democrats in support of the package, which would fund U.S. military activity in Iraq and Afghanistan. But Democrats also attached language that would start troop withdrawals within 120 days of passage, with a March 31, 2008, goal for completing combat operations in Iraq. Some troops could remain in Iraq after that deadline in order to conduct counterterrorism training and security operations.
President Bush has made it very clear that any funding bill that has a timeline in it will be vetoed, and both the House and Senate versions have timelines in them. What this means is that it will take a while for the funding packages to get approved between the two houses, then Bush will veto the resulting bill, which will then lead to further delays in the funding process. As if that weren’t bad enough, Victory Caucus points out that the funding bill isn’t even on the emergency calendar. As has also been widely reported, both the House version and the Senate version are full of plenty of pork to help bribe just enough people to actually get a majority on this, including:
HOUSE
—–
- The effects of Hurricane Katrina on shrimp populations
- Asbesos abatement at the Capitol power plant
- A minimum wage increase
- Peanut storage
… among other things.
SENATE
——
- Sugar beet disaster abatement
- Insect infestation damage reimbursements
- Livestock production losses
… among other things.
Of course, none of these things have anything at all to do with the war or funding thereof and, better yet, none of it is going to get past Bush’s desk since he refuses to sign any funding bill that contains a withdrawal date or provision.
So, what happens now?
- The House and Senate will spend some time after spring break ironing out a unified bill to hand to President Bush.
- President Bush will undoubtedly repeal the bill.
- The House and Senate will posture about how Bush is preventing them from funding the troops, even though they’re the ones that wrote a bill that Bush made abundantly clear will never get past his desk (oh wait, they’re doing that already). Meanwhile, Bush will continue to posture similarly against them.
- Eventually, someone will give.
The only question is… who? Personally, I suspect that, considering the amount of pork they had to throw into their bills to get them off of their own desks, I somehow doubt they’re in anywhere near as strong of a position as they’d like to be on this. Consequently, I suspect this is more symbolic than anything else and is simply meant to appease the Democratic base so they can say, “Well, Bush is still evil and we still can’t defeat him,” or something to that effect.
In the end, though, it’s the troops that’ll suffer.
This makes me yearn for line item veto. I know that is was determined unconstitional and I’m mostly in favor of checks and balances preventing a strong executive. If we had a more representational government than we currently, meaning without the current deadlocked and antagonistic two-party dynamic, I think that line item veto would best serve the interests of the people.
I’m not inherently against the line-item veto, but the odds of seeing it come back would be fairly slim, constitutional or not. I do think there are some serious issues with the current two-party dynamic, though I’m much more in favor of an antagonistic one than one where they work together, seeing as, when they work together, it’s usually just to line their own pockets.