Senate rejects cutting off funds for war

Democratic presidential candidates supported setting a date to end U.S. participation.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Anti-war Democrats in the Senate failed in an attempt to cut off funds for the Iraq war Wednesday, a lopsided bipartisan vote that masked growing impatience within both political parties over President Bush's handling of the four-year conflict.
The 67-29 vote against the measure left it far short of the 60 needed to advance. More than half the Senate's Democrats supported the move, exposing divisions within the party but also marking a growth in anti-war sentiment from last summer, when only a dozen members of the rank and file backed a troop withdrawal deadline.
Ohio's Republican Sen. George Voinovich and both of Pennsylvania's senators, Democrat Bob Casey Jr. and Republican Arlen Specter, voted no. Ohio's Sen. Sherrod Brown, a Democrat, didn't vote.
"It was considered absolute heresy four months ago" to stop the war, said Sen. Russell Feingold of Wisconsin, author of the measure to cut off funds for most military operations after March 31, 2008.
Ironically, the vote also cleared the way for the Democratic-controlled Congress to bow to Bush's wishes and approve a war funding bill next week stripped of the type of restrictions that drew his veto earlier this spring.
Democrats vowed in January to force an end to the war, and nowhere is the shift in sentiment more evident than among the party's presidential contenders in the Senate.
For the first time, Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, Barack Obama of Illinois and Joe Biden of Delaware joined Sen. Chris Dodd in lending support to the notion of setting a date to end U.S. participation in the war.
Clinton, the Democrats' presidential front-runner in most early polls, has adamantly opposed setting a date for a troop withdrawal, and she gave conflicting answers during the day when asked whether her vote signified support for a cutoff in funds.
Republicans voted unanimously against the measure, and several judged it harshly. Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the GOP leader, said it fixed a "surrender date" for the United States.
There were 28 Democrats in favor of advancing the bill, and 19 opposed.
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