Steve John F Kerry Kagen

From the Green Bay Press.

I voted against it before I voted for it. Can we say EARMARKS!

What will the WACKY LEFT say about Kagen's vote?

"Kagen reverses vote on war funding

The Associated Press • June 17, 2009

WASHINGTON — Rep. Steve Kagen has done an about-face on funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan." Kagen reverses vote on war funding | greenbaypressgazette.com | Green Bay Press-Gazette

I just have to post the whole article. Might come in handy in 2010.

The northeast Wisconsin Democrat voted for a $106 war spending bill Tuesday, a month after rejecting a House version because he said it lacked a plan for bringing U.S. troops home. Tuesday’s measure, a compromise between earlier House and Senate versions, also contained no troop withdrawal provision.

But the final measure did include $7.7 billion to fight the swine flu pandemic. Kagen said that, along with a couple of additional items, was enough to gain his support.

“The bill that I did vote for provided something that we really do need, and that’s funding for the pandemic,” Kagen told reporters Wednesday during his weekly conference call. “There were a number of reasons I voted the way I did.”

One reason, he said, was a provision to provide $534 million for troops who have had their enlistments involuntary extended since Sept. 11, 2001. Each would get $500 for each month they remained in service under stop-loss orders.

Kagen was among 21 Democrats voting yes to the war spending bill who had voted no on the earlier House bill on May 14. Their votes on Tuesday helped give the Democratic leadership a 226-202 victory.

Kagen was the only Democrat in the Wisconsin delegation who changed votes. Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Milwaukee, voted against the war funding both times.

All three Wisconsin Republican House members sided with their majority in opposing the measure, with Janesville’s Paul Ryan reversing his earlier stand.

Kagen said his switch did not represent a change of heart on troop withdrawal.

“I have consistently supported our troops before, during and after their brave service in harm’s way,” he said in a statement following his vote Tuesday. “There are many people across northeast Wisconsin just like me who strongly oppose our involvement in Iraq’s religious civil war, and I have expressed their views directly to the president and my colleagues in the House.”