Congress Hopes to Finish Work on $388 Billion Spending Bill
SANCHEZ: Welcome back to CNN LIVE TODAY. I'm Rick Sanchez. For Americans, maybe yourself, living with maxed out credit cards and a budget bursting at the seams, take solace. There's a similar fiscal strain on Capitol Hill. In fact, folks you have nothing on your federal government. CNN congressional correspondent Joe Johns is joining us now from Capitol Hill to try and make sense of this story, which is really about borrowing an awful lot of money and spending an awful lot of money. Joe, to you.</s>JOE JOHNS, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Certainly that's true, Rick. Many here on Capitol Hill now hoping the 108-Congress has finally entered the race to the finish line. Of course, work began bright and early on the floor of the House of Representatives today. The focus behind the scenes, of course, is a massive piece of catchall legislation that the authorities are trying to cobble together, to put this work to bed before the Thanksgiving holiday. One important piece of business that has been completed, another huge spending bill. This, of course, a bill to raise the federal borrowing limit by $800 billion. Democrats kicking and screaming, of course, about that bill. Including Congressman Hastings of Florida on the floor today talking about it.</s>REP. ALCEE HASTINGS (D), FLORIDA: Just yesterday, my friends in the majority voted to again raise the debt limit. They added billions and possibly trillions more to our national debt, leaving our children and grandchildren to pick up the tab for generations to come. And they called themselves the party of fiscal responsibility. Shame on them.</s>JOHNS: Republicans, of course, accentuating the positive; choosing to try to talk about the successes of the 108 in its final days. Among them, Republican Congressman Pete Sessions.</s>REP. PETE SESSIONS (R), TEXAS: We're proud that we will have in place this next year again, once again for low-income seniors, the ability for this government to help them not have to make a decision in buying and receiving their prescription drugs. That's something I'm proud of.</s>JOHNS: Of course, the big question is how long will all of this take? The best guess right now is the House of Representatives will probably take up that big spending bill late this evening. The Senate possibly tomorrow. Of course, this will include nine different, unfinished spending bills that the Congress has to get out of the way before they leave for the holidays. Rick, back to you.</s>SANCHEZ: Joe, Republicans -- are Republicans concerned in this case that they may be setting themselves up for a bit of a backlash? Many would argue they changed the rules on the Tom DeLay issue and now they're changing the debt ceiling, as well. All in a matter of days.</s>JOHNS: Well, that's something that Democrats will always howl about in this situation, because they are in the minority. But the bottom line on it is, that the Treasury Department has said this has to be done. They've run out of maneuvers to try to figure out how to pay the government's bills until the Congress raises the debt ceiling. So it's something that just simply has to be done, the administration says. And they view it as something that they have no choice on.</s>SANCHEZ: So in other words, if they didn't do this, they would have been in what, default?</s>JOHNS: Right, that's the problem. The governments has a number of, you know, huge obligations out there that it has to pay for. And simply has run out of money. The Treasury Department has been sort of smoke and mirrors, you might call it, to try to figure out how to pay these bills until the Congress increases the debt limit. It would be a big problem for the credit of the United States, of course. And some bills wouldn't get paid if they didn't raise the debt limit -- Rick.</s>SANCHEZ: Joe Johns, thanks so much for making sense of this for us. We'll certainly be getting back to you as well. Fred, over to you.</s>WHITFIELD: Well, other business on the Hill. Embattled Republican Senator Arlen Specter has won his battle to chair the Senate Judiciary Committee. That chairmanship reveal -- seemed in peril rather, earlier this month after the moderate Republican suggested that judicial nominees would have difficulty winning approval, if they opposed abortion rights. Fellow Republicans unanimously approved his chairmanship, after he promised there'd be no such litmus test, and that President Bush's nominees would get fair and fast committee hearings. A recount of the governor's race is scheduled to get under way tomorrow in Washington State. Workers will begin their scrutiny with four counties in a statewide recount of some 2.8 million ballots. The process should be completed by Wednesday. But election officials warn that it could be Christmas before Washington State residents know who the next governor is. In the closest governor's race in state history, the Republican leads by a mere 261 votes.</s>SANCHEZ: Righting a wrong nearly 60 years in the making. Still to come, how some Minnesota students made sure that a 77-year-old woman received a high school honor that she had been denied.</s>GERRI WILLIS, CNN-FN PERSONAL FINANCE EDITOR: And do you want to get out of town? We'll show you the best places to go for travel deals when CNN LIVE TODAY continues.