Good for you for voting your conscience.

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Washington - The Republican-controlled Congress helped itself to a $3,100 pay raise on Friday, then postponed work on bills to curb spending on social programs and cut taxes in favor of a two-week vacation.

In the final hours of a tumultuous week in the Capitol, Democrats erupted in fury when House GOP leaders maneuvered toward a politically-charged vote - and swift rejection - of one war critic's call for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq. You guys are pathetic, pathetic, Massachusetts Rep. Martin Meehan yelled across a noisy hall at Republicans.

On another major issue, a renewal of the Patriot Act remained in limbo as an unlikely coalition of liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans sought curbs on the powers given law enforcement in the troubled first days after the 2001 terrorist attacks.

Both the House and Senate were in session after midnight Thursday, working on the tax and deficit-cutting bills at the heart of the GOP agenda, before returning to work a few hours later.

What it does is start to turn down the escalating costs ... for our children and our grandchildren. One of the things that we cannot leave to that next generation is a huge deficit that they can't afford, House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said after enactment of a $50 billion deficit-reduction bill.

The Republicans are taking food out of the mouths of children to give tax cuts to America's wealthiest. This is not a statement of America's values, said the Democratic leader, Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California. Democrats believe that together, America can do better, she said, invoking the party's new campaign slogan.

The cost-of-living increase for members of Congress - which will put pay for the rank and file at an estimated $165,200 a year - marked a brief truce in the pitched political battles that have flared in recent weeks on the war and domestic issues.

So much so that the issue was not mentioned on the floor of either the House or Senate as lawmakers worked on legislation whose passage will assure bigger paychecks.

Lawmakers automatically receive a cost of living increase each year, unless Congress votes to block it. By tradition, critics have tried to block increases by attaching a provision to the legislation that provides funding for the Treasury Department. One such attempt succeeded in the Senate earlier in the year, but the provision was omitted from the compromise measure moved toward final approval.

The overall bill provided $140 billion for transportation, housing and other programs. It cleared the House on a vote of 392-31. Senate passage was by voice vote.

Pay raise harmony aside, Republicans spent the day celebrating a party-line, post-midnight vote in which the House cleared legislation to reduce deficits by $50 billion over five years. The vote was 217-215, with all the Democrats who voted in opposition, along with 14 GOP rebels.

Acting Majority Leader Roy Blunt of Missouri said Republicans would make their tax cut bill the top item on the agenda when lawmakers return to the Capitol in December.

The House-passed measure attacks deficits by limiting spending for the first time in a decade on Medicaid, food stamps, student loans and other benefit programs that normally rise with inflation and eligibility.

The House GOP leadership had hoped to clear the measure a week ago. It was forced to retreat when Republican moderates rebelled, even after Hastert agreed to strip out a controversial proposal to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.

The Senate-passed companion measure calls for less deficit reduction, $35 billion over five years, but includes the ANWR provision.

The differences are expected to make it difficult for the House and Senate to reach a compromise by year's end, particularly since Republicans can't count on any Democratic support.

The tax bill presents difficulties of its own for a GOP majority struggling to translate last fall's election gains into this year's legislative achievements.

The Senate cleared a measure after 1:30 a.m. that calls for $60 billion in cuts over five years.

The measure drew bipartisan support, passing on a vote of 64-33. Its provisions would continue a series of existing tax breaks that otherwise will expire, and shelters 14 million upper middle-income families from higher taxes.

The White House has threatened a veto, citing a provision that raises taxes on oil companies.

The House has yet to pass a companion measure. When it does, the tax on oil companies is unlikely to be included, and it is likely to be jettisoned before a compromise measure reaches the White House.

Hastert said Republicans want to make sure that we support our troops that are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan ... a lot of people say: Look, this is a tough time, we just ought to pull out and leave. We pull out and leave, we strand an effort to make sure that we can tamp down terrorism, to tamp down a dictatorship, that we can stabilize an area in the Middle East, he added.

GOP aides conceded the last-minute maneuver was designed to put Democrats in a political squeeze - voting for withdrawal and exposing themselves to attacks from the White House, or voting against it and risk angering the voters that polls show want an end to the conflict.

Democrats angrily attacked the GOP move, then lined up with Republicans to vote against a troop withdrawal in hopes of draining the issue of its political significance. The vote was 403-3 against the measure.

Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., called the measure a piece of garbage and an attack on Rep. John Murtha. The Pennsylvania Democrat, a decorated veteran and respected congressional voice on military matters, said Thursday it was time for the troops to come home.

House and Senate negotiators announced a tentative agreement earlier in the week to pass a seven-year extension of the Patriot Act. Key senators lawmakers involved in the talks balked at the terms, and officials said they would resume compromise efforts when Congress returns to work in December.

we should have stayed out of Irag and minded our own business.I think we need to work on cleaning up America before we start on other countries. I don't like the fact that innocent men, wome and children were and are being killed. I stated that he is the lesser of 2 evils and I am following my conscience.

Please direct me to where in the Constitution that it says that voting is a RIGHT? It is not a right. We have a right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness!!

but I tend agree with you. I think it is sad race still matters all these years later, rather depressing really. You can keep your nose clean, do all of the right things according to society's standards and color still matters. Why? Who cares about color what about his policies? Shouldn't they matter more?

Small polling place, only 4 machines, 1 of which was already belly up and I was just 15th in line. Anyway, vote is in, and I didn't vote a straight party one button. I punched each one separately...I wanted to savor the moment! :-)

I have enjoyed the debate and I for one am glad there are so many in our profession engaged in the process and concerned for the country, no matter which side you fall on. So, hats off to you, and may the best man and woman win! :-)

that your vote is based on the dislike of an anonymous poster on a tiny little chat board, it was not worth much anyway.

From the beginning, I've always known I would not vote for Obama. His plans will not work. He will destroy small businesses with his taxes causing loss of jobs. His plans of taking from the rich to give to the poor will only enable the low-life scum we have in this country to remain lazy and worthless. His associations with certain individuals and his membership for 20 years to a church designed on black power and the hate of whites........I cannot trust this man to be the commander and chief. I do not agree with his plans for healthcare. I do not agree with his extremist view point on abortion. I do not condone gay marriage. I cannot under good conscience vote for Barack Obama. If we elect Barack Obama to be the president, we will sorely regret it.

So bash me as you will. Obviously, from posts below, this is a support Obama political board and should anyone differ......OMG....you should be thrown off of the board. You all have been sucked into this mainstream media love affair with a man that we cannot trust, a man who doesn't have the experience, and a man who promises change that he cannot bring. The one thing I can agree with Obama is this.....his campaign does give me hope.....it gives me hope that enough people get their heads out of their butts and John McCain wins this election and becomes the next President of the United States of America!!!!

Since everyone is at least a bit familiar with John McCain�s record when it comes to strolling through a market in Baghdad with hundreds of his closest guards, or how he wants to stay in Iraq for 100 years (except when he flip flops on that).

But not that many really, truly know just how horrific his voting record is when it comes to the troops. And it is pretty consistent � whether it is for armor and equipment, for veteran�s health care, for adequate troop rest or anything that actually, you know, supports our troops.

This is chock full of links to the roll call votes, and the roll call votes have links to the actual underlying bills and amendments. I present this so that there is support and things that can be rattled off when saying that McCain is not a friend of the military. Feel free to use it as you want, but this can be tied into the "Double Talk Express". But here is a very quick statement - John McCain skipped close to a dozen votes on Iraq, and on at least another 10 occasions, he voted against arming and equipping the troops, providing adequate rest for the troops between deployments and for health care or other benefits for veterans.

In mid 2007, Senator Reid noted that McCain missed 10 of the past 14 votes on Iraq. However, here is a summary of a dozen votes (two that he missed and ten that he voted against) with respect to Iraq, funding for veterans or for troops, including equipment and armor. I have also included other snippets related to the time period when the vote occurred.

March 2004: McCain once again voted for abusive tax loopholes over veterans when he voted against creating a reserve fund to allow for an increase in Veterans' medical care by $1.8 billion by eliminating abusive tax loopholes. Jeez, McCain really loves those tax loopholes for corporations, since he voted for them over our veterans' needs.

October 2003: McCain voted to table an amendment by Senator Dodd that called for an additional $322,000,000 for safety equipment for United States forces in Iraq and to reduce the amount provided for reconstruction in Iraq by $322,000,000.

So there it is. John McCain is yet another republican former military veteran who likes to talk a big game when it comes to having the support of the military. Yet, time and time again, he has gone out of his way to vote against the needs of those who are serving in our military. If he can�t even see his way to actually doing what the troops want, or what the veterans need, and he doesn�t have the support of veterans, then how can he be a credible commander in chief?

you will need to keep things like OBAMA and OSAMA straight. The political system was based on the assumption that voters would know the difference between a tall black man running for president and a tall man in a sheet running for cover. Study up. Only a few more weeks . . . I'm betting you can do it.

CI'm thinking about voting Democratic because I believe everything the main stream media tells me about the Presidential candidates.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because English has no place being the official language in America.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because I'd rather pay $4 for a gallon of gas than allow drilling for oil off the coasts of America.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because I think the government will do a better job of spending my money than I could.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because when we pull out of Afghanistan and Iraq , I know the Islamic terrorists will stop trying to kill us because they'll think we're a good and decent country.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because I believe people who can't tell us if it will rain in two or three days, can now tell us the polar icecaps will disappear in ten years if I don't start riding a bicycle, build a windmill or inflate my tires to proper levels.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because it's alright to kill millions of babies as long as we keep violent, convicted murderers on death row alive.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because I believe businesses in America should not be allowed to make profits. Businesses should just break even and give the rest to the government so politicians and bureaucrats can redistribute the money the way they think it should be redistributed.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because I believe guns, and not the people misusing them, are the cause of crimes and killings.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because when someone with a weapon threatens my family or me, I know the government can respond faster through a call to 911 than I can with a gun in my hand.

I'm thinking abou t voting Democratic because oil companies 5% profit on a gallon of gas are obscene, but government taxes of 18% (federal and state) on the same gallon of gas are just fine.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because I believe three or four elitist liberals should rewrite the Constitution every few months to suit some fringe element that could never get their agenda past voters.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because illegal aliens are not criminals, are not sucking up resources through government aid, hospital services, education, or social services, but are just people trying to make a better life by coming to America illegally. We can't blame them for that, can we?

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because now I can now marry whatever I want, so I've decided to marry my horse.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because they know best how to run a mortgage company like Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac. They will guarantee I get a low interest loan even if I don't have a job and can't pay it back.

I'm thinking about voting Democratic because I agree that Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac executives should get 10's of million dollars in bonuses, then leave and join a Democratic presidential candidate's campaign as his advisors.

Makes ya wonder why anyone would ever vote Republican, doesn't it?

I do not know if this has been posted or not, as I do not have much time to read th boards, but feel this is great. Here is why I am voting Rebublican. This is great Dems! watch it.

By the way, Voting Democrat or American voter, did not come up with that on her own. Just Google some of her text and you will find where some of it came from.