In a rare show of bipartisanship on Iraq, the US House of Representatives on Tuesday voted to make the Pentagon produce plans to withdraw US troops - but did not mandate the withdrawals.
Some House Democrats went much further than that vote, however and warned they would hold try to hold up President George W. Bush's latest war funding request until he agrees to a goal of ending combat operations in Iraq by the time he leaves office in early 2009.
The chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Wisconsin Democratic Rep. David Obey, said his panel would not even consider the funding request - which Pentagon chief Robert Gates says will be about $189 billion - until early next year.
Obey also threatened to try to raise taxes to fund the war, saying it was wrong to keep borrowing to pay for it. But that idea was quickly shot down by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The legislation that passed the House 377-46, gathering votes from nearly as many Republicans as Democrats, would require the Pentagon to submit regular reports on withdrawal planning to Congress' defence committees. The House has voted several times this year to pull US troops out of Iraq, but the Senate - where the Democratic majority is narrower - is gridlocked over the issue.
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