A pitiful drop in a bucket, if you ask me!
SENATE PASSES 2007 BUDGET BILL, VA GETS INCREASE --

VA will get $3.6 billion more than last year.

President Bush signs.

VA NEWS FLASH from Larry Scott at VA Watchdog dot Org -- 02-15-2007 #8


Story here... http://www.bloomberg.com/
apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=
aVHyC6BYMbR8&refer=us

Story below:

UPDATE: President Bush signed the budget bill on February 15, 2007.

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Congress Passes $463.5 Billion Spending Measure for Fiscal 2007

By Brian Faler



(Bloomberg) -- Congress approved increased funding for education grants, veterans' health care, law enforcement and international AIDS relief as part of a $463.5 billion spending measure, completing work on the 2007 budget more than four months late.

The Senate's 81-15 vote to pass the spending measure leaves most government programs funded at last year's levels, drops more than 9,300 pet projects proposed by lawmakers and increases funding for a handful of programs favored by the chamber's Democratic majority.

``This is not a perfect resolution, but it is a thoughtful resolution,'' said Senator Robert Byrd, a West Virginia Democrat who heads the Appropriations Committee. The measure ``will ensure that we answer some of our nation's most pressing needs.''

Republicans, who weren't given an opportunity to amend the legislation, complained they were forced to choose between approving the plan or shutting down the government.

``We are all rubberstamps: Take it or leave it,'' said Senator Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican. ``We have the option of closing down the government if we don't approve this rubberstamp procedure, and we are not going to do that. We had experience with the closing down of the government back in December of 1995 and it was a very bitter experience.''

A stopgap spending measure now funding 13 of the 15 federal departments expires tomorrow night.

Been Approved

The legislation, which has already been approved by the House, now heads to President George W. Bush, who has signaled that he will sign it into law. His approval will end months of uncertainty for agency officials who have been waiting to find out their budgets for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1.

Bush's signature also will end a process that began more than a year ago, when he called for holding domestic spending below the rate of inflation for the third consecutive year while providing much larger increases -- at least 7 percent -- for both defense and homeland security programs.

Last year's Republican majority approved increases for the security programs, yet couldn't pass the nine appropriation measures funding the government's domestic programs. Republicans said in December that they were giving up, leaving the remaining budget work to the Democrats. Since then, Democrats wrote the measures according to their own priorities while remaining within the overall budget limit set by the Republicans last year.

Byrd said Democrats cut more than $11 billion from 125 government programs, eliminated funds for more than 9,300 lawmaker's pet projects and left 450 programs frozen at last year's levels to free up money for the party's priorities.

Law Enforcement

The plan adds $3.6 billion for veterans' health-care programs, $1.6 billion for federal, state and local law enforcement and $1.4 billion more for international AIDS relief.

The legislation will expand the budget for Pell Grants, which go to college students from low-income families, by $616 million. That increase will boost the maximum grant by $260 to $4,310, the first such increase in four years.

It would provide an additional $200 million for special education programs along with $104 million for Head Start, a pre-school education program.

The measure provides an additional $620 million for the National Institutes of Health, along with $207 million more for community health centers. It increases funding for basic scientific research, providing $200 million more for the Department of Energy's Office of Science, $335 million more for the National Science Foundation and $50 million more for the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

No Veto Threat

While the Bush administration didn't threaten to veto the measure, it criticized the legislation for shortchanging initiatives such as its Global Nuclear Energy Partnership -- an anti-nuclear-proliferation program -- while ignoring the president's call to reduce or cut 141 other programs.

Congressional Republicans said it failed to adequately fund priorities such as military construction projects. Some Democrats said the measure leaves programs stuck at last year's funding levels, amounting to cuts once inflation, required pay increases for government employees and other costs were counted.

Praise

The legislation drew praise from some lawmakers, such as Senator Jim DeMint, a South Carolina Republican, for halting the rapid increase in pet projects, called earmarks, seen over the past decade.

``I applaud the Democrats,'' said DeMint. ``There are no new earmarks in this spending resolution.''

DeMint and other lawmakers expressed concern that their colleagues may still fund their pet projects by phoning the federal agencies with individual wish lists.

The Energy Department has said that it has begun fielding such requests. A half-dozen lawmakers have asked Bush, who denounced the earmarking practice in his State of the Union speech, to ``clarify that agencies of your administration will not be bound or give any preference to earmarks contained in committee reports or in direct communications from members of Congress or their staff.''

A senior administration official, who declined to be identified, told reporters this week at a briefing that he hasn't heard of any such requests elsewhere in the government, while saying it is a potential problem. He said the administration will explain how it intends to implement the measure after it is signed into law.



To contact the reporter on this story: Brian Faler in Washington at bfaler@bloomberg.net

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Larry Scott --