Congress gives final approval on war funding

WASHINGTON – In a 92 to 6 vote, the Senate Thursday approved unrestricted funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that allows continuation of the current military course of action through the end of President Bush’s term and beyond.

In exchange for that unencumbered freedom to operate in Iraq, Bush agreed to demands by congressional Democrats to create a new higher-education benefit for veterans and their families, and to extend unemployment benefits.

In the end, the $257.5 billion emergency spending bill, which had been the subject of two months of intense debate and negotiation, won overwhelming support in the Senate and the House, where it was approved last Friday by 416 to 12. Idaho Republican Larry Craig cast one of the six votes against the measure in the Senate.

Bush is expected to sign the bill next week.

Since House passage last week, the outcome of Bush’s last war funding fight with the Democratic-controlled Congress had been a foregone conclusion. But the bill became entangled in unrelated disputes that created a logjam in the Senate, as conservatives opposed a housing bill and liberal Democrats opposed a rewriting of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Unable to overcome parliamentary hurdles, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., postponed consideration of both until Congress returns from its weeklong Fourth of July recess. In addition, the Senate failed to clear a 60-vote threshold on a bill to postpone a 10.6 percent fee cut for doctors who treat Medicare patients. That reduction will take effect next week.

By setting aside those issues, the Senate cleared a path for the war funding measure, which ended up with enough legislative morsels to please just about every philosophical corner of Congress.

Bush began the fight in early May by demanding a “clean” war funding bill that would provide the $108 billion he needed for Iraq and Afghanistan with no restrictions on how he could conduct the war and with no additional domestic spending favored by Democrats.

Having lost every attempt in the previous year to limit Bush’s hand in Iraq, Democrats quickly gave up their effort to force a timeline for troop withdrawals and focused their efforts on a domestic agenda.

That included the education benefit, which gives veterans who have served since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks the ability to pay tuition at even the most expensive state universities.