The White House has demanded that Congress approve a bill strictly with war funding, but the Senate measure also includes a $52 billion, 10-year measure that would pay for higher-education benefits for military veterans, an $11 billion, 13-week extension of unemployment insurance, $1 billion for low-income heating assistance and billions more for Gulf Coast reconstruction. It’s unclear what bill will emerge from the House, but Democratic leaders have conceded that the price tag and domestic add-ons would need to be slashed in order to generate enough support from the conservative wing of their caucus, which is concerned about growing the budget deficit.

Bush said that if Congress does not act promptly, “critical accounts at the Department of Defense will soon run dry.” He added that civilian employees may face “temporary layoffs,” and the Pentagon would be forced to “close down a vital program that is getting potential insurgents off the streets and into jobs.” If the supplemental spending bill is not enacted after July, Bush said, the department would “no longer be able to pay our troops,” including ones in Iraq and Afghanistan.

U.S. President George Bush wants $178 billion more in military spending to help pay for wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. VOA White House Correspondent Scott Stearns reports, opposition Democrats are adding domestic spending to that bill, and Mr. Bush says he will veto it if those programs are not removed.

What it means when the US goes to war

Hat Tip to this article by Chris Hedges - Troops, when they battle insurgent forces, as in Iraq, or Gaza or Vietnam, are placed in “atrocity producing situations”. Being surrounded by a hostile population makes simple acts, such as going to a store to buy a can of soda, dangerous. The fear and stress push troops to view everyone around them as the enemy. The hostility is compounded when the enemy, as in Iraq, is elusive, shadowy and hard to find. The rage soldiers feel after a roadside bomb explodes, killing or maiming their comrades, is one that is easily directed, over time, to innocent civilians who are seen to support the insurgents.

Civilians and combatants, in the eyes of the beleaguered troops, merge into one entity. These civilians, who rarely interact with soldiers or marines, are to most of the occupation troops in Iraq nameless, faceless and easily turned into abstractions of hate. They are dismissed as less than human. It is a short psychological leap, but a massive moral leap. It is a leap from killing - the shooting of someone who has the capacity to do you harm - to murder - the deadly assault against someone who cannot harm you. [See Entire Article]

This is not a game of Chess or Monopoly. This is not a board game with inanimate objects challenging other inanimate objects. Human flesh and human psyche is changed forever by the folly of disconnected leaders. Fairy tales abound warning us, from childhood, about good and evil leaders. Those fairy tales give us heroes who win, after a terrible cost in lives and property. Religions tell similar tales, trying to teach believers about consequences from their actions. The most glaring misinterpretation for some major religions appears to mix up earthly and heavenly rewards and consequences, with terrible results.

Politicians have responsibilities to those who elect them. But, they also have a responsibility to the world around them. Eight years of distortion and extortion have changed the world. The lessons have been tragic and harsh. The final acts of President Bush will determine how hard it will be for the world to recover from all the bad parts of this fairy tale. The only positive side from these years of torment are acute public awareness of the world itself. The Earth is changing under our very feet while global economic and political landscapes shift.

President Bush appears to be plodding along like nothing has changed …

Hat Tip to thedailyhypocrite for their revealing Bush comments.

Pentagon Warns of Civilian Layoffs If Congress Delays War Funding

Democrats Are Firm on Link to Troop Withdrawals From Iraq

By Jonathan Weisman and Ann Scott Tyson Washington Post

The Defense Department warned yesterday that as many as 200,000 contractors and civilian employees will begin receiving layoff warnings by Christmas unless Congress acts on President Bush’s $196 billion war request, but senior Democrats said no war funds will be approved until Bush accepts a shift in his Iraq policy.

Skirmishing over war funding has continued for nearly a year, but the White House and Congress appear ready to push toward a showdown in the coming weeks. Democratic leaders are convinced that Congress’s abysmal approval ratings stem in large part from its inability to force Bush to change his approach in Iraq. But with violence declining in Iraq, Republicans believe they are in an even stronger position to stay the course.

“We are calling on Congress and the Democrats in Congress to send the president supplemental war funding without arbitrary surrender dates and without micromanaging the war before they leave for their next vacation,” White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that controls defense funding, said the country owes troops “more than just a debt of gratitude. We owe them and their families a new way, a way that leads home.”

Now that Congress has approved a huge base budget for the Pentagon of $459 billion, from which funds can be shifted for various needs, Democrats can rightfully assert that there is no immediate funding crisis, said Cindy Williams, a former head of the Congressional Budget Office’s national security division. The Pentagon can borrow billions of dollars slated to be spent at the end of the current fiscal year to pay for operations now, she said.

But with the cost of the Iraq war soaring, fund transfers this winter could be huge, and disruptions would be inevitable. With Democrats saying that future funds will have policy strings attached, “both sides are playing a big game of chicken here,” she said.

“The money has already been provided by the House of Representatives. If the president wants that $50 billion released, all he has to do is call the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, and ask him to stop blocking it,” said House Appropriations Committee Chairman David R. Obey (D-Wis.). House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) also blamed Republicans for any lack of money for the war.

The Pentagon, therefore, has started planning for the possibility that the Army and the Marine Corps will exhaust their operations and maintenance budgets. In the past two weeks, those budgets have been used to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which cost about $10.5 billion a month.

Under current budget rules, the Defense Department can shuffle only $3.7 billion a year without seeking congressional approval. Morrell said that shows the department has already exhausted its options, but Democratic congressional aides said that a request from the Pentagon for additional transfer authority would almost certainly be approved. The goal, said one leadership aide, is to keep the administration on a short leash.

So, how does the Pentagon plan on pressuring Congress to give them ‘unlimited funding’ without any strings? Ask King George. The threat of shutting the government down ‘with the exception of critical’ agencies is how they extort what they want.

The specter of labeling the Democrats ‘bad guys’ has worked every time. Pelosi crumbles, Reid crumbles, then we concede to the dictator again. How can an administration get away with this? Keep funding a war ‘over there’ then trash the wounded ‘over here’. Force the wounded to pay back their sign up bonus and pay some of their own medical bills. Demean the mentally damaged casualties and withdraw continued support.

The pressure on commanders to target PTSD in the field, then send them home with “personality problems” due to “pre-existing mental flaws” is outrageous. This administration is waging war on our own soldiers. This administration gives lip service to the uproar about PTSD and it’s spreading impact on America’s population, but, the deception still shouts betrayal.

America is betraying everything it touches. We have been taken advantage of. The civilized among us have been too polite to roll up our sleeves and take a real punch at this bully. Have we been brainwashed into lying down in front of a freight train and “hoping” it stops in time? Hope has failed, we are wasting time. Action is all that’s left!