House Democrats Pull Budget Offer

The GOP Is Negotiating In Bad Faith, Obey Says

By Jonathan Weisman

Washington Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, December 11, 2007; A03

A Democratic deal to give President Bush some war funding in exchange for additional domestic spending appeared to collapse last night after House Appropriations Committee Chairman David R. Obey (D-Wis.) accused Republicans of bargaining in bad faith.

. . . "Absent a Republican willingness to sit down and work out a reasonable compromise, I think we ought to end the game and go to the president's numbers," Obey said. "I was willing to listen to the argument that we ought to at least add more for Afghanistan, but when the White House refuses to compromise, when the White House continues to stick it in our eye, I say to hell with it."

. . . "There are a lot of people who were very disappointed last year when nobody got any earmarks. If they do it again for the second year in a row, it will be a very bitter pill to swallow," said Rep. Ray LaHood (R-Ill.), an appropriator who complained that he could lose $400,000 he needs for the Abraham Lincoln bicentennial celebration, slated to begin Feb. 12.

--read entire article--

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To the list of whipped puppies running around under the feet of Nancy Pelosi, add House Appropriations Committee Chairman David R. Obey.

This 'lame duck' president runs the Congress as though he had a solid majority. George Bush, the man everyone mocked as 'not smart enough' and who is opposed by 70% of the American public cannot be denied by Pelosi or Reid. He's found the keys to the next 329 days leading up to the election--dare the Democrats to deny him his war and then brand them 'soft on terrorism.'

If Obey had any balls, he'd deny any further funding of this war and get us out.

Instead, the president will get what he wants and flog the Democrats every single day before the camera of his choice for being soft on terrorists. Joe McCarthy did just fine with soft on communism until Ed Murrow and a fed-up Senate put him out of business.

That was back in the days when Senators were more than yes-men for lobbyists and McCarthy was no president.

Times they are a changing, as we become ever more under the power of an administration that Nancy Pelosi's puppies haven't the guts, the honor or the moral courage to challenge.