More Money, Plus a Deadline

It looks like the House Dems may have come up with an Iraq bill the Usurper can't veto.

The House has passed a $124 billion war spending bill - wait, wait, it gets better - that sets an August 31, 2008 deadline for bringing the troops home.

The Washington Post initially managed to spin it as a defeat for liberals (seriously, why hasn't Ben Bradlee beaten the crap out of every editor there yet?), but dropped that nonsense after the final vote.

It's a military spending bill with a troop withdrawal deadline. Boy George has sworn to veto any Iraq deadline, but wouldn't vetoing the funding mean hurting the troops?

The vote was 218-212, with two Republicans voting yes and 14 Democrats voting no.

The two Republicans voting yes were Walter B. Jones of North Carolina and Wayne T. Gilchrest of Maryland. Seems to me I've heard good things about Jones before, in terms of being kool-aid-resistant, but why does Gilchrest hate America?

The 14 Democrats voting no were John Barrow (Ga.), Dan Boren (Okla.), Lincoln Davis (Tenn.), Dennis J. Kucinich (Ohio), Barbara Lee (Calif.), John Lewis (Ga.), Gene Taylor (Miss.), Jim Marshall (Ga.), Jim Matheson (Utah), Michael R. McNulty (N.Y.), Michael H. Michaud (Maine), Maxine Waters (Calif.), Diane Watson (Calif.) and Lynn Woolsey (Calif.).

I'd bet that Kucinich for sure and probably the California dems voted no because the deadline isn't yesterday, but does anybody know anything about the others?

Here in Kentucky, the vote broke along party lines. Not sure whether liberal John Yarmuth or Blue Dog Ben Chandler was more reluctant. I'm sure John hates the late deadline and Ben hates having any deadline at all.

Now it goes to the Senate. Who originally said that the Senate is where good bills go to die?