Spending bills top agenda of lame-duck Congress

WASHINGTON - When Congress adjourned last month for the election, it appeared lawmakers would have more to do when they returned this week than haggle over how to fund federal domestic agencies in 2005.

Republican leaders held out the possibility of using the "lame duck" session to revamp the intelligence community along lines suggested by the Sept. 11 commission, and perhaps limit class-action lawsuits, a priority for business groups. GOP officials have not abandoned those goals. But barring last-minute breakthroughs, prospects do not appear good that either will be enacted before the 108th Congress ends.

House-Senate negotiators on the intelligence legislation acknowledged that time was running out. If so, the proposal will have to be restarted in the Congress that convenes in January.

Republicans are still divided on the creation of a czar to oversee the CIA, Defense Department intelligence units and other federal information-gathering agencies, as recommended by the 9/11 commission.

Business lobbyists said last week they were urging lawmakers to attach the class-action bill to a big package of domestic spending legislation that must be enacted before Congress adjourns for the year, but they had received no guarantees.

That leaves action on a mammoth $385-billion "omnibus" spending bill for the 2005 fiscal year that began Oct. 1 as the main order of business. The bill, still taking shape, will lump together a new foreign aid bill and as many as eight other bills funding every agency except the Pentagon, the Department of Homeland Security and the District of Columbia.

After years of rapid growth in many domestic programs, Congress this year agreed to strict limits on discretionary spending not related to defense or counterterrorism. The Bush administration budget called for an increase in domestic spending amounting to six-tenths of 1 percent. Congress, bowing to fiscal conservatives, went one better and called for a freeze.

In effect, spending on popular domestic programs finally is being squeezed by the huge costs of fighting the war on terrorism at home and abroad. Congress approved a $391-billion defense spending bill for fiscal 2005, but the figure did not cover costs of the Iraq war. Congress in July approved $25-billion more for the war, and the administration is expected to seek as much as $75-billion in addition early next year.

Adding to the fiscal pressure is the soaring budget deficit, which has pushed the federal government close to a $7.4-billion statutory limit on borrowing. Republican leaders plan to attach to the omnibus bill a provision increasing the debt ceiling by $700-billion to $800-billion, according to GOP sources.

To save money - and force the Bush administration to share the pain - early versions of the annual spending bills slashed numerous White House priorities, including new funds for community colleges, the president's signature Millennium Challenge foreign aid program and even the American Masterpieces cultural program championed by Laura Bush.

The challenge now, said Sean Spicer, spokesman for the House Budget Committee, is for Congress to maintain "self-control." That could be especially difficult after an election, he suggested.

The House and Senate are working under a self-imposed $821.9-billion ceiling for all spending requiring annual appropriations. Enacted bills funding defense, homeland security and Washington District have used up $436-billion of that total.

Senate versions of the domestic package contain $8-billion more spending than the House measure, as a result of accounting devices employed to pump up the bills to a level where they could win approval from senators on the Appropriations Committee.

Under pressure from fiscal conservatives, however, most of the gimmicks - other than one that will ensure help for elderly and poor people's winter heating bills - are expected to be dropped. To stay within the budget target and still pay for additional spending on such key activities as veterans health care and education, GOP leaders plan a small cut in hundreds of programs.

Federal aid to education, running about $60-billion a year, could lose hundreds of millions of dollars. Republicans note, however, that the bill funding education, health and job training soared by 75 percent over the last seven years.

Some controversial riders added earlier to the spending legislation may be dropped. Those include eased restrictions on trade with Cuba, a provision partially blocking the administration's new rules on overtime pay eligibility and a provision that would set aside administration rules encouraging private contractors to compete for jobs performed by federal workers.

Another focus for the Senate when it reconvenes on Tuesday will be the efforts of Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., to convince his fellow Republicans that he deserves to be the next Judiciary Committee chairman. Opposition has arisen to the moderate Republican, who supports abortion rights, as a result of his postelection statements that nominees with antiabortion views would have a tough time winning Senate confirmation.

He has since stressed that he would be a team player if he succeeds the current chairman, Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, who must step down because of GOP-imposed term limits.

Specter told ABC's This Week he had never applied a litmus test to Supreme Court nominees and had voted for antiabortion judges.

The issue has taken on some urgency because of the possibility of openings on the Supreme Court.

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, 80, is seriously ill with thyroid cancer, and three other justices have had cancer. The average age of the nine court members is 70. Speculation on a Supreme Court retirement has grown in part because there has been no vacancy in more than 10 years.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said Specter must still make his case to Republican senators.

A chairman, Frist said on Fox News Sunday , is responsible to "the feelings, the beliefs, the values, the procedures that are held by the majority of that committee," which overwhelmingly opposes abortion.

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