The Swine Line

It’s that time of the year again - time to load up the “Emergency” War Supplemental.  The hijinx are in full swing with billions of dollars being diverted from a bill that is supposed to go to the troops in the battlefield:

Roll Call: Supplemental Roils Congress

Despite pressure from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to keep the measure narrowly focused, Senate Appropriations Chairman Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) plans to offer his domestic spending package that would include almost $4.6 billion in relief for Hurricane Katrina and other natural disasters, $1.2 billion for science programs, about $450 million for highway repairs and hundreds of millions more for food safety and local law enforcement grants, to name a few.

..“I am sure that appropriators are aware that loading this up like a Christmas tree could put us in a difficult situation with the House [and] the White House, as well as being a PR nightmare,” said one senior Senate Democratic aide.

Still, in question is whether Senate Democratic appropriators will seek to add even more domestic spending at the panel’s markup today.

“There will be some things added. There’s no question about it,” said Appropriations member Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.). “It’s a question of how many and what conditions will there be during the markup, unless there’s a decision made that nothing gets added, which I can’t imagine.”