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Originally Posted by powerclown
You are correct DC, I misspoke. Looking over the bill online, I see they needed some republican votes in there as well. What I don't understand is, why did the Dems send this to the President, knowing beforehand that 1) Bush would veto, 2) they wouldn't have the votes to override the veto?
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They did it because they had a mandate from the American people as a result of the 06 election to do it. And at the very least, the vote put every member of the House and Senate on the record.
However, even if Congress were to submit a veto-proof bill, Bush, through his mouthpiece, Tony Snow, has indicated he would use a Civil War era law, the Feed and Forage Act of 1864 to continue to fund his surge.
The Food and Forage Law has been used twice by Rumsfeld/Bush:
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Should the situation get dire, the secretary of defense could invoke the Civil War-era “Feed and Forage Act” to continue war operations. The act allows the military to obligate money for clothing, food, fuel, housing, transportation and medical supplies in excess of available appropriations for the year, without first getting congressional approval.
The authority under the Feed and Forage Act has some limitations, but it allows the military to continue its essential contracts and operations. It requires congressional notification, and Congress has to appropriate the necessary funds after that. Obligated funds can only be disbursed after a congressional appropriation.
In 2005, when the supplemental was delayed until May, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld warned that he would have to invoke the Feed and Forage Act to keep the deployed troops operating because funds were running out at the beginning of May. The supplemental was signed May 5, 2005.
Rumsfeld also invoked the act in 2001 after the terrorist attacks, but Congress came up with money quickly, before the Pentagon incurred any expenses.
The Pentagon and the administration can also use the act as a tool to tell Congress that it can spend money without the lawmakers’ power of the purse.
“If there is no relief, they [the Pentagon] would invoke the Feed and Forage provision,” an Office of Management and Budget spokesman told The Hill. Disruptions in the Pentagon’s war operations will start around April 15, he said, and if supplemental funds are still lacking by May 15, the Department of Defense may warn that it will invoke the act.
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/...007-03-28.html
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Until the publilc outcry against continuing the failed Bush pollicy becomes even greater than the 60% + current level to the point that it becomes politically unpaletable even to a lame duck and the Republican members of Congress, Bush will get his way...and the Republicans in 08 will ultimately suffer the consequences.