May 8, 2007 1:54 PM

GOP & Dem Senators: Give Bush An Iraq Blank Check So We Get Our Summer Vacation

The caricature of the Senate club with lazy, fat old politicians sitting around smoking cigars too busy to do real work has now, apparently, come to life. In an incredibly telling story just out on the Associated Press wire, we find out that after House Democrats agreed to push a proposal to fund the Iraq War for 60 days in order to exert ongoing oversight and not grant the White House yet another blank check, "several Senate Democrats said they would oppose a short-term funding bill because it leaves open the question of whether troops will get the resources they need after July." These unnamed "several Senate Democrats" were joined by Republican House leaders who attacked the proposal in the same way.

What's incredible is that such an approach in no way "leaves open the question of whether troops will get the resources they need" since all that would be required is another congressional vote if more resources are needed. Everyone in Washington knows that. And so what we are really seeing here are Washington politicians who don't want their regular summer vacations impeded with those pesky constitutional responsibilities of oversight and the power of the purse. But instead of simply saying "hey, we want our summer break!" they are running to reporters to use U.S. troops in combat to justify their laziness.

I thought I had seen everything - I really did. But this tops it all. What's next? Will the slogan of the campaign against the short-term funding bill be "Pass A Blank Check: We Want to Hit the Beach?" Or will it be "Leave the Troops In Iraq So We Can Go Fishing?"