A House of Representatives measure blending money for US President Barack Obama’s Afghanistan troop surge with last-ditch moves by governing Democrats to salvage their faltering jobs agenda faces an uphill climb in the Senate.
After long delays, House Democrats forced through the approximately US$80 billion measure on Thursday night as their final act before leaving for a weeklong Fourth of July break.
However, the Senate passed a significantly slimmer measure in May and it will take weeks to reconcile the two measures.
It’s just the latest disconnect between the battling House and Senate, which have also been unable to approve an extension of unemployment benefits and other economic stimulus steps.
FILIBUSTERS
Repeated Senate filibusters are chiefly to blame, but Democratic leaders in the House and Senate also disagree on strategy and tactics and long-simmering tensions have reached boiling point.
House leaders went ahead with the measure on Thursday despite knowing they have only limited leverage in forcing the Senate to accept more than US$20 billion in domestic spending add-ons, such as US$10 billion in grants to school districts to avoid teacher layoffs, US$5 billion for Pell Grants to low-income college students and US$700 million to improve security along the US-Mexico border.
The White House weighed in with a veto threat over US$800 million in cuts to education programs that would be used to help pay for the additional domestic spending under a “pay-as-you-go” culture that the administration itself advocates.
The measure is anchored by nearly US$60 billion passed by the Senate that blends US$30 billion for 30,000 extra troops in Afghanistan with money for disaster aid, foreign aid and disability benefits for Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange.
The House measure will receive little support from Senate Republicans, who have the votes to filibuster it, according to Senator Thad Cochran, a senior Republican whose support was central to Senate passage.
UNRELATED SPENDING
House Republicans supportive of the Afghanistan effort voted against the measure, angered that Democrats were using the must-pass legislation to try to advance unrelated spending.
“The Democrat majority is treating this troop funding bill like a cash cow for their election-year wish-list,” said Republican Representative Jerry Lewis.
Top Democrats such as Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey and Speaker Nancy Pelosi insisted on adding the domestic funding items, viewing the war funding bill as their last, best shot at resuscitating the party’s faltering jobs agenda.
The money was critical to winning support from Democrats frustrated over deepening Senate gridlock that has killed, among other ideas, US$24 billion in aid to cash-starved states to help governors avoid tens of thousands of layoffs.
US Defense Secretary Robert Gates has been agitating for the war money, requested in February, but the real deadline for Congress isn’t until recess next month.
The delays in approving the war funds will mean the Pentagon will have to employ burdensome book-keeping maneuvers to maintain the war effort.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing