On Nov. 16, Republican leaders in the House and Senate will seek a short session to deal with spending, an intelligence overhaul and not much else. The reasons for a short agenda are both strategic and political. Republicans will enjoy a stronger majority next year and are in no hurry to push measures through now.

With respect to the FY 2005 appropriations, subcommittee clerks are seeking to put together an initial omnibus for action the week of Nov. 16. House Appropriations Chairman C.W. Bill Young (R-Florida) and his Senate counterpart, Ted Stevens, (R-Alaska) both of whom will relinquish their gavels in January, want to complete the bills this year while they control the panels and can steer funding toward their states. However, they are still waiting for leadership guidance on how to handle an $8 billion gap between the House and Senate bills. Senate appropriators may be under pressure from GOP leaders to drop some of their extra spending. At this point, it seems likely that any spending added to the omnibus above the FY 2005 discretionary spending cap would be offset by an across-the-board cut from non-defense spending.

Another issue slated for debate is debt limit legislation. The government hit the current debt ceiling of $7.384 trillion on Oct. 14. That required Treasury Secretary John Snow to initiate accounting maneuvers to provide funding for government operations while remaining beneath the statutory ceiling. A scheduled auction of Treasury bills cannot be completed by Nov. 18 without congressional action.

House and Senate Republican conferees are still divided over a bill (S. 2845) to overhaul the intelligence gathering system along the lines proposed by the Sept. 11 commission and it is doubtful they will reach agreement during the lame duck session. The Senate version of the bill would give a national intelligence director budget authority over all intelligence agencies and allow the government to make public the total cost of intelligence. The Department of Defense backs the House version that would give the intelligence director less authority and allow funding for intelligence to be funneled through secret accounts to Pentagon intelligence agencies.

With Republicans in firm control, an outside chance exists that they will bring up the Central American Free Trade Agreement, which many Democrats oppose. Republicans were unwilling to vote for it before the election because of trade-sensitive agricultural and textile interests in their states.