28 September 2006

Section 504

For most of us, this is a week that seems like most others on the green banks of the Potomac. If you looked at Washington from high above, you might not see anything unusual. Perhaps you would notice more helicopters darting back and forth, aluminum dragonflies that know no season. The increased security would be largely invisible.

The Heads of state of Pakistan and Afghanistan were here, briefly, to dine on spicy sea bass and pumpkin cake with the President. They waited until the sun was down, and it was appropriate to break the Ramadan fast, and both apparently are secure enough in their jobs that they can afford to be out of their countries.

Not the same deal for the Prime Minister of Thailand. He arrived in New York last week to discover himself stateless.

I imagine he is still around here, somewhere. President Nazarbayevof of Kazakhstan is here for dinner tonight as well, solidifying an alliance with Washington. I do not know yet what is on the menu, though apparently the President will mention his dissatisfaction with the portrayal of his country in the comedic stylings of British actor Sacha Baron Cohen. Mr. Cohen plays the Islamic character Ali G., if you have not heard, and a bumbling Kazakh news reader.

This visit, coming as it does on  the heels of President Mushareff's appearance on Comedy Central, which runs Ali G shows, this opens up an entirely new channel of diplomacy. The President reportedly loathes state dinners and cable television.

Also unseen from above would be the bleary eyes on Capitol Hill. The Members are laboring mightily into the night to pass legislation that will reflect well on them as they return to their districts and states to Face the Music.

All 435 members of the House are up for election, and a third of the Senate. Five weeks to the referendum on the performance of Congress in the Administration's second term, and the fifth since the attacks that have inalterably colored this young century.

The House approved the $447.6 billion dollar appropriation it will take the Defense Department to limp through Fiscal 2007. The tally was overwhelming, 394-22, and the conference bill goes back to the Senate today.

This is the first of the fiscal 2007 appropriations bills to emerge from House-Senate conference and reach the House floor for approval. The bill is properly called a “Christmas tree,” since it is festooned with provisions that have nothing whatsoever to do with Defense. It will serve as a vehicle for a continuing resolution of Congress, since it is almost New Years.

The Federal Budget Year ends on Sunday. If there was world enough, and time, we could stumble through how the government became detached from the calendar, or how the Federal payroll periodically danced from the end of the month to the first. But for now, suffice it to say that it al makes as much sense as putting our clocks forward and back for daylight savings time.

Vendors like myself were interested to note that the legislation also includes a $70 billion supplemental fund to pay for costs related to combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan during the “bridge period” that will cross election day, when the Congress is adjourned to await the judgment of the voters.

There will be a lame duck session of Congress in December, a sort of last gasp in which those who have been re-elected and those who have been defeated return for a last turn in this edition of Congress.

Interestingly, there is no prospect for a Defense Authorization Bill. Legislation normally comes in matched sets, one “authorizing” the purposes for money to be spent, and another “appropriating” the money itself. Between the two, the latter is the more significant, since as the saying goes, “Money talks, and Bullshit walks.”

There has always been a preponderance of power in the Appropriations side of the legislative branch, but the blanace has tipped markedly since the mid-1990s, when the two sides of the process were radically misaligned. We all became confused, Congress and Executive Branch alike, blundering through an awful year when some programs were appropriated but not authorized, and others vice versa. We learned to say “A, not A” and shrug helplessly.

The Authorization committees like Armed Services and Intelligence often wrestle in bitter debate. This season, House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-IL, and Senate Armed Services Chairman John Warner, R-VA, are at loggerheads over defense money being spent for federal court security and an anti-gang immigration measure. The distinguished gentlemen are theoretically of the same party, and the dispute does not appear to have anything to do with Defense.

But no matter. Whether the defense authorization bill is considered in a lame duck session in December, or left to gather dust, it doesn't matter.

The Appropriations committees came up with their own answer. Section 504 of the National Security Act states clearly that “Money appropriated is considered to be authorized,” absent a passed bill from the authorization committees.

It is a safety valve, and it permits the government to continue to spend money even though parts of it do not perform their Constitutional duties.

I often wish I had the foresight to include a Section 504 to cover issues in my personal life. It would be along the same lines as the national security version, slightly amended. “Stuff I should have done, but did not, shall be considered to be OK, absent any other action which may supercede it.”

Or something. I am going to go out and watch the helicopters, and get ready to celebrate New Years.

Copyright 2006 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com

Close Window