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Washington in brief
Compiled from Times wires Conservatives stall spending measureWASHINGTON -- Unhappy conservatives on Wednesday forced House leaders to postpone a vote on a bill to keep federal agencies functioning through next week, a measure made necessary by pre-election gridlock over Congress' budget work. With the government's new fiscal year starting next Tuesday, lawmakers have yet to complete any of the 13 annual measures that finance federal operations. The short-term bill would keep agencies open through Oct. 4 and was expected to easily pass the House and Senate this week. But conservatives led by House Budget Committee Chairman Jim Nussle, R-Iowa, refused to let the House debate the measure, which had won support from other Republicans, Democrats and the White House. Nussle declined to comment, but aides said he was worried that the bill could allow too much spending. Despite Nussle's objections, GOP leaders planned a full House debate for today. U.N. DUES: The House voted Wednesday to make the final payment on back dues to the United Nations. The dues payment is part of an $8.6-billion bill authorizing State Department programs for next year. An additional $5.2-billion was authorized for counterterrorism and military aid to U.S. allies. The bill, approved by voice vote, hasn't been scheduled for a Senate vote but faces little resistance there. The bill authorizes payment of $244-million to the United Nations, the final part of the $926-million in back dues the United States agreed to pay in 1999. House backs abortion refusals by hospitalsThe House passed a bill Wednesday that would let hospitals and insurance companies refuse to perform or pay for abortions without forfeiting Medicare and other federal funding. Anti-abortion activists hailed the 229-189 vote as a key action that would shield Catholic hospitals and other health providers that oppose abortion. Supporters of abortion rights accused conservatives of attempting to scale back women's access to the procedure. Both Republicans from west-central Florida voted for the measure. Rep. Jim Davis, D-Tampa, voted against it, and Rep. Karen Thurman, D-Dunnellon, did not vote. It is unlikely the measure will win enough support for passage in the Democratic-controlled Senate. Protesters plan to disrupt D.C. traffic FridayProtesters are pledging to shut down the capital Friday with demonstrations that will "disrupt traffic and convey a symbolic message" against capitalism and war. The protests are a prelude to even larger demonstrations planned for the weekend during meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. The FBI issued a warning this week that computer hackers may conduct "cyber protests" during the financial meetings. Head of IRS says it can't keep up with tax cheatsThe Internal Revenue Service is losing the war on tax evasion because the methods of cheating grow increasingly sophisticated while the IRS has barely enough resources to keep pace, the agency chief said in a report Tuesday. The conflict between a declining work force and complex avoidance schemes has created "a huge gap between the number of taxpayers whom the IRS knows are not filing, not reporting or not paying what they owe, and our capacity to require them to comply," said Charles Rossotti in a report to the IRS Oversight Board. Since 1997, Rossotti said, the number of income tax returns filed has risen by 12-million, with tax collections increasing $527-billion and refunds growing by $121-billion. At the same time, the IRS has struggled to implement a series of new reform and tax laws, and its number of full-time personnel dropped by 16 percent from 1992 to 2001. Amnesty decries young offenders' executionsThe campaign to abolish the death penalty aims next to stop executions of criminals who committed their crimes as juveniles, Amnesty International said Wednesday. The human rights group released a report showing that the United States has executed 18 juvenile offenders since 1990 -- compared with 14 in the rest of the world. Of the 18 American executions, 11 took place in Texas. Since the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that execution of mentally retarded people is unconstitutional, the group said similar grounds should be applied to ban capital punishment for juvenile offenders.
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From the Times wire desk
From the AP |
