Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies

Senate approves Pentagon bill

WASHINGTON - The Senate gave overwhelming approval Thursday to a $416-billion Pentagon spending bill for next year, including a $25-billion down payment for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and extra money for adding 20,000 Army troops and equipment like Chinook helicopters.

The 98-0 vote underscores the election-year consensus between President Bush and both parties in Congress to increase the military's budget at a time when two wars and efforts against terrorism are taxing Pentagon resources.

Before passage, the Senate added aid for Sudan, assistance to New York and Boston for hosting this summer's political conventions, and about two dozen projects for lawmakers' home states. Those included money to buy three airplanes for a college in Montana.

Not counting the funds for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, the bill is $22.5-billion, or 6 percent, over this year's total.

Bush proposed having the power to move the entire $25-billion for Iraq and Afghanistan to whatever war-related accounts he chose.

The Senate bill would give him flexibility to move $2.5-billion of the $25-billion.

The rest would be assigned to specific accounts, though some - such as $17.5-billion for operations and maintenance - are still broad enough to give the president much leeway.

The legislation closely tracks a defense bill the Senate approved Wednesday night that lays out next year's government-wide defense programs, which are expected to total $447-billion. That bill provided no actual money, but Thursday's does.

The bill is also similar to a $417-billion defense spending bill the House approved on Tuesday.

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. - In a blow to prosecutors, a police investigator conceded Thursday that he deliberately failed to mention a witness who contradicts crucial elements of the murder case against Scott Peterson.

Detective Allen Brocchini admitted that he excluded from his reports any reference to a woman who recalled seeing Laci Peterson at the warehouse where her husband stored his small boat.

The woman's story provides an alternate explanation for why a strand of hair that DNA testing indicates might have come from Laci Peterson turned up on a pair of pliers in the boat.

ERIC RUDOLPH CASE: A federal judge on Thursday delayed the trial of serial bombing suspect Eric Rudolph until next year, ruling his lawyers needed more time to prepare. U.S. District Judge Lynwood Smith tentatively set opening arguments for May 24.

SEVERE WEATHER: Residents of central Wisconsin began a cleanup Thursday after storms and tornadoes swept across the region. Damage estimates Thursday ran into the millions. Gov. Jim Doyle declared 11 counties hit by the storms as disaster areas. One man was killed as storms Wednesday evening moved through the central part of the state, an area battered in recent weeks by rain and flooding. Downed power lines cut electricity to about 14,000 people.

SOLICITOR GENERAL: Solicitor General Theodore Olson, who represented the Bush administration before the Supreme Court and became a voice for strong antiterrorism policies after his wife died in the Sept. 11 attacks, said Thursday he is resigning to return to law practice. Olson, 63, said he will leave his post in July.

U.N. AMBASSADOR: The Senate on Thursday agreed to send one of its own, former Sen. John Danforth of Missouri, to the United Nations to serve as the new U.S. ambassador. Danforth replaces John Negroponte, who was sworn Wednesday as U.S. ambassador to Iraq.