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VA STARTS NEW FISCAL YEAR WITHOUT A BUDGET AS
DEMOCRATS MISS DEADLINE -- Congress has not
completed
even one of the dozen spending bills
appropriating money for
the day-to-day operations of 15 Cabinet
departments.
Only ONCE in the past 13 years has Congress
passed the VA budget on time.
For years veterans blamed the do-nothing
Republican Congress.
Now, we can blame the do-nothing Democratic
Congress.
The VA, and other agencies, will be running on
a Continuing Resolution. That means they can only spend at last
year's level.
This causes huge problems in VA planning which
leads to more delays in necessary healthcare.
For more about the VA budget, use the VA
Watchdog search engine...click here...
http://www.yourvabenefits.org/ses
search.php?q=va+budget&op=ph
Story here...
http://ap.google.com/
article/ALeqM5hotzjZVYI1NIQDGm
LLtJ54k0DeGgD8RV8DM81
Story below:
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Democrats Miss Budget Deadline
By ANDREW TAYLOR
WASHINGTON (AP) — The most basic job of Congress is to pass the bills
that pay the costs of running the government. After criticizing
Republicans for falling down on the job last year, Democrats now are the
ones stumbling.
The government's new budget year begins Monday, but Congress has not
completed even one of the dozen spending bills appropriating money for
the day-to-day operations of 15 Cabinet departments.
President Bush has lobbed veto threat after veto threat at Democratic
spending bills because, taken as a whole, they would break his budget by
$23 billion or more. Though Bush is sagging in the polls, his threats
have majority Democrats tied in knots.
Bush chided them Saturday in signing a bill that prevents a government
shutdown and gives lawmakers 48 days more days to complete the budget
work.
"Earlier this year, congressional leaders promised to show that they
could be responsible with the people's money. Unfortunately they seem to
have chosen the path of higher spending," the president said in his
weekly radio address.
This is hardly the first time that Congress has fallen behind schedule.
Last year, when Republicans ran Congress, they gave up on the budget
altogether and forced Democrats to finish it on Valentine's Day in
February — 4 1/2 months late.
Now it is Democrats, after roasting Republicans for the way they botched
their budget work, who are vulnerable to criticism that they are doing
no better. Republicans are happy to oblige.
"It is deja vu all over again," said Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., who a
year ago was chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.
He quoted the current chairman, Rep. David Obey, D-Wis., as blasting
Republicans in the past for "failing to meet even the most basic and
minimal expectations that the country has for it by way of doing our
routine business."
Like last year, most of the Democrats' appropriations failings can be
blamed on the Senate, which has passed just four of the 12 spending
bills.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has devoted lots of debate
time to Iraq, immigration and a defense policy bill at the expense of
the nuts and bolts work of passing spending bills.
Lewis said "the failure of the appropriations process can be laid
squarely at the feet of the present Senate majority leader."
The Senate's top Republican, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said spending
bills "are our first responsibility, not our last." He added, "We've had
plenty of votes on other things — nearly 30 votes on Iraq. We should be
making room for other things."
Reid said Friday he hopes to complete two more bills this coming week,
before the Senate takes a vacation. He blamed Bush and GOP opposition to
nonrelated bills for the delay.
"As you know, there's controversy with the president over his threats to
veto all these bills," Reid said. "We know we should have gotten to them
sooner, but we've had 48 filibusters we've had to deal with this year
which has slowed things down significantly."
It long has been assumed that the Bush administration and Democrats
would find themselves in a legislative train wreck that would not get
resolved until late in the fall. Even in years when one party runs both
Capitol Hill and the White House, Congress invariably needs extra time
to complete its budget work.
But Democrats raised expectations in last year's campaign that they
would do a better job running Congress than Republicans had.
The four bills that have passed the Senate are in House-Senate talks,
including the homeland security measure and a veterans bill. The White
House has backed off a veto threat on the veterans bill and Democrats
are confident they can win an override vote on the homeland security
measure if it contains $3 billion sought by Republicans for a fence
along the U.S.-Mexican border.
Republicans believe they can stick with Bush to sustain vetoes on the
remaining bills. Democrats see little point in sending bill after bill
to him to get vetoed in a fight the White House relishes
Bush has absorbed much criticism from conservative voters for failing to
veto a single spending bill in his first six years in office. Many
Republicans want a series of vetoes that would allow the party to
reclaim its reputation as the party of smaller government.
Just as President Clinton won many of his battles with Republicans over
the budget, Bush has great leverage so long as GOP lawmakers stand with
him. That is the biggest reason Democrats would prefer to negotiate.
"The president needs to put down his veto pen and pick up the
telephone," said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md. "Our
differences ... are relatively minor. We need to work out those
differences, rather than engage in political posturing."
Democrats have some leverage, too. They are holding back action of
Bush's $189 billion war request and can delay also delay the Pentagon's
nonwar budget bill until the White House agrees to talks on domestic
spending.
Both sides see the Pentagon spending bill, with a $40 billion increase
for the military, as the engine that will power legislation encompassing
all of the uncompleted bills into law — maybe by Christmas.
EDITOR'S NOTE _ Andrew Taylor has covered budget issues in Congress
since 1997.
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Larry Scott --
