www.reuters.com WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The US Senate approved a 6 billion military spending bill on Saturday that funds the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and also includes money to extend jobless aid and Medicare payment rates for two months. Barack Obama By a vote of 88-10, the Senate approved the bill and sent it to President Barack Obama to sign into law. The House of Representatives passed the bill on Wednesday. The bill covers Pentagon operations through September 30, 2010. But the …

,[18] * A limit or repeal of the itemized deduction for medical expenses,[19] * A limit on the Qualified Medical Expense definition,[20] * An increase in the payroll taxes on students,[21] * An extension of the Medicare payroll tax to all state and local government employees,[22] * An increase in taxes on hospitals,[23] * An increase in the estate tax,[24] * A tax on drug companies,[27] * An increase in the corporate tax on providers of health insurance,[28] and * A 0000 deduction …

when his congressional allies seek to raise taxes to pay for all the new spending that this cost-cutting entails. We aren’t talking about short-term spending either; this isn’t a trillion-dollar investment in a new system that will ultimately save money. The Congressional Budget Office says the leading health-care-reform proposals will increase health-care spending and make the budget harder to balance in the long run. Yet saving money is the President’s principal stated rationale for …