For the first time since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, CIA analysts see one of al-Qaeda’s offshoots – rather than the core group now based in Pakistan – as the most urgent threat to U.S. security, officials said.

The sober new assessment of al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen has helped prompt senior Obama administration officials to call for an escalation of U.S. operations there – including a proposal to add armed CIA drones to a clandestine campaign of U.S. military strikes, the officials said.

“We are looking to draw on all of the capabilities at our disposal,” said a senior Obama administration official, who described plans for “a ramp-up over a period of months.”

The officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters, stressed that that analysts continue to see al-Qaeda and its allies in the tribal areas of Pakistan as supremely dangerous adversaries. The officials insisted there would be no letup in their pursuit of Osama bin Laden and other senior figures thought to be hiding in Pakistan.

Indeed, officials said it was largely because al-Qaeda has been decimated by Predator strikes in Pakistan that the franchise in Yemen has emerged as a more potent threat. A CIA strike killed a group of al-Qaeda operatives in Yemen in 2002, but officials said the agency has not had that capability on the peninsula for several years.

“We see al-Qaeda as having suffered major losses, unable to replenish ranks and recover at a pace that would keep them on offense,” said a senior U.S. official familiar with the CIA’s assessments.

Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, as its Yemen-based group is called, is “on the upswing,” the official said. “The relative concern ratios are changing. We’re more concerned now about AQAP than we were before.”

Al-Qaeda in Yemen is seen as more agile and aggressive, officials said. It took the group just a few months to set in motion a plot that succeeded in getting an alleged suicide bomber aboard a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day.

More important, officials cited the role of Anwar al-Aulaqi, an American-born cleric whose command of English and militant ambition have helped transform the Yemen organization into a transnational threat.

Philip Mudd, a former senior official at the CIA and the FBI, argues in a forthcoming article that the threat of a Sept. 11-style attack has been supplanted by a proliferation of plots by AQAP and other affiliates. “The sheer numbers . . . suggest that one of the plots in the United States will succeed,” he writes in the latest issue of CTC Sentinel, a publication of the Combating Terrorism Center at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y. In the future, he said, “the Pakistan-Afghanistan border region will not be the sole, or even primary, source of bombing suspects.”

U.S. officials said the administration’s plans to escalate operations in Yemen reflect two aims: improving U.S. intelligence in Yemen and adding new options for carrying out strikes when a target is found.

The CIA has roughly 10 times more people and resources in Pakistan than it does in Yemen. There is no plan to scale back in Pakistan, but officials said the gap is expected to shrink.

Details of the plans to expand operations in Yemen have been discussed in recent weeks among deputies on the National Security Council at the White House, officials said. According to one participant, the talks are not about whether the CIA should replace the U.S. military in its leading operational role in Yemen, but “what’s the proper mix.”

Although the CIA has expanded the number of case officers collecting intelligence in Yemen over the past year, officials said the agency has not deployed Predator drones or other means of carrying out lethal strikes.

Instead, attacks over the past eight months have been the result of secret military collaboration between Yemen and the United States.

U.S. Special Operations troops have helped train Yemeni forces and helped them to execute raids. A senior U.S. military official said the United States has not used armed drones in Yemen, mainly because they are more urgently needed in the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq. As a result, intermittent strikes on al-Qaeda targets have involved cruise missiles and other weapon that are less precise.

An airstrike on a suspected gathering of al-Qaeda operatives in Marib province on May 25 involved a cruise missile launched from a U.S. naval vessel. Among those killed was the deputy governor in the province, who was reportedly seeking to persuade the militants to give up their arms. The human rights group Amnesty International later said it found evidence that U.S. cluster munitions were used in the attack.

Proponents of expanding the CIA’s role argue that years of flying armed drones over Pakistan have given the agency expertise in identifying targets and delivering pinpoint strikes. The agency’s attacks also leave fewer telltale signs.

“You’re not going to find bomb parts with USA markings on them,” the senior U.S. official said. Even so, the official said, the administration is considering sending CIA drones to the Arabian Peninsula “not because they require the deniability but because they desire the capability.”

A senior Yemeni official indicated that the government would not welcome CIA drones. “I don’t think we will ever consider it,” the official said. “The situation in Yemen is different than in Afghanistan or Pakistan. It is still under control.”

Introducing a covert CIA capability might also improve the U.S. ability to carry out attacks – perhaps from a U.S. base in Djibouti – if the Yemeni government were to curtail its cooperation.

That relationship is “in as positive a place as we’ve been for some time,” the senior administration official said. But, he added, “we always have to be in a position where we are able to protect our own interests should that be necessary.”

The concern about al-Qaeda in Yemen is remarkable considering that the group was all but stamped out on the peninsula just a few years ago and is known more for near-misses than successful, spectacular attacks.

Indeed, some government intelligence analysts outside the CIA argued that it would be wrong to conclude that al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen has eclipsed the organization’s core.

“We still do view al-Qaeda core as they view themselves,” a senior U.S. counterterrorism analyst said, “which is the vanguard of the jihad, providing a lot of global direction and guidance.”

Even under constant pressure from Predator attacks, al-Qaeda has proven remarkably resilient. Officials also stressed that it is surrounded by other militant groups in Pakistan that share its violent aims.

The U.S. citizen who planted a failed bomb at Times Square earlier this year, for example, said he had been trained by the Pakistani Taliban.

But concern about AQAP has risen sharply in the aftermath of the failed Christmas Day attack.

U.S. officials cited recent indications that AQAP has shared its chemical bomb-making technology with other militant organizations, including Somalia-based al-Shabab.

Because Yemen is an Arab country and the ancestral home of bin Laden, some analysts fear that it could be more difficult to dislodge al-Qaeda there than in Pakistan.

Officials acknowledged that since a military strike missed Aulaqi in December, they have had few clues on his whereabouts. Aulaqi has been linked to three plots in the United States, and his presence has further radicalized his peers.

“The other leaders of AQAP are predominantly Yemenis and Saudis, and their worldview and focus is on the peninsula,” said the senior U.S. counterterrorism official. Aulaqi “brings a world view and focus that brings it back here to the U.S. homeland.”

millergreg@washpost.com finnp@washpost.com

An economist who advised Democrats on the $787 billion stimulus has increased his prediction of the odds of the economy entering a double-dip recession.

Mark Zandi, the chief economist of Moody’s Analytics, pegged the chances of a second recession at one in three. Just a few weeks ago, he saw only a 20 percent chance of another economic slowdown.

“I don’t think we’ll double-dip, but it will be a close call,” Zandi told reporters Tuesday at a breakfast sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor.

He cited weak consumer confidence, nervous businesses and investors, and plummeting home sales to explain the gloomier outlook.

Zandi, who has advised both political parties on the economy, spoke one day after the National Association of Realtors reported sales of previously owned homes fell in July by 27.2 percent. The housing report was much worse than analysts had expected, and it fueled a drop in stocks on Tuesday.

The negative news on the housing front followed a jump in unemployment claims last week. On Friday, the Commerce Department is expected to announce that the economy grew at a slower pace than expected in the second quarter.

The faltering economic recovery is bad news for Democrats, who are headed into a midterm election that could tilt the House and Senate back to the GOP. House Republican leader John Boehner (Ohio) on Tuesday hammered President Obama’s policies and called on him to fire his economic team.

Zandi said there is little that can be done to ease the economy’s woes in the near term, partly because of political differences in Washington. He also said it would not be surprising if unemployment rose ahead of November.

He said one thing Congress and the White House could do to boost confidence in the economy would be to reach a compromise on looming tax increases that would delay any tax hikes until at least 2012. He said it would be a gamble to let tax rates rise on the wealthy, as proposed by the Obama administration.

“Raising taxes on upper-income households, I think we’d still avoid recession,” Zandi said, “but the odds would rise.”

Zandi has made his position on the tax cuts clear to both parties. He wrote an op-ed in The New York Times earlier this month arguing that Obama’s plan to eliminate tax breaks for the wealthy would be an unnecessary gamble.

Zandi urged both parties to reach a middle ground in which tax rates would remain stable in 2011. He suggested higher tax rates on couples earning more than $250,000 and individuals earning more than $200,000 could be phased in when the economy recovers, possibly by 2012.

Boehner and most Republicans want all of the tax breaks to be made permanent.

Zandi blames the European debt crisis and the effect it had on the U.S. stock market for much of the economic problems. Without that crisis, Zandi said the U.S. might have already reached a self-sustained recovery.

He also said Congress should have more quickly extended unemployment insurance benefits that were approved in early August. Because of the delay, millions temporarily lost unemployment benefits at a critical time for the economy, he said.

Businesses that survived the recession are skittish about hiring or investing in their companies, but are healthy and sitting on capital. Zandi said this underlying strength is a major reason why he does not believe the economy will double-dip.

Green Wave Energy’s World Power System
Newport Beach-based Green Wave Energy Corp. will showcase its flagship products – the World Power System and World Light Pole – at the Great Park of Irvine Corporate Offices on Friday.

Founded in 2008 by Mark Holmes and David New, Green Wave Energy manufactures renewable energy products such as wind turbines, wave generators and water current turbines for the U.S. and global markets. The company designs, sells and installs in the industrial, commercial, government and military business channels.

“The World Power System and World Light Pole are designed to change the way most people think about how and where we can generate electrical power, and how much it should cost to make electrical power available when building housing developments, parks, railroads, ports, airports and other large real estate projects,” said Holmes, Green Wave’s CEO.

Green Wave’s World Power System is a quiet, self-sufficient power generator that uses solar and wind energy to produce clean electricity. It’s portable and simple to assemble, making it an appealing replacement for the toxic diesel generators that are usually utilized at construction zones, disaster relief sites and other places where off-the-grid power is necessary. The World Power System generates enough energy to power both outdoor and indoor applications, or a home or commercial business.

The World Light Pole is a virtually indestructible, self-sufficient power system that also uses solar and wind energy. It can be permanently installed like an ordinary streetlight, or temporarily in a couple of hours. Not only does the World Light Pole provide light in remote locations, it can also run small household appliances and power remote cell, Wi-Fi, and security camera applications. This product could potentially save millions of dollars that would otherwise have to be spent on traditional electrical grid infrastructures to power lights and traffic signals.

“The best way to really understand the impact of our technology is to come out and see our demonstration and just how much power is generated,” Holmes said. “It will change the way people think about renewable energy.”

The World Power System and World Light Pole demonstrations are open to the public and will take place at 4 p.m. There are no definitive plans made to install the Green Wave systems at the Great Park.

BRADENTON — A proposal to hire a transition administrator at Port Manatee sparked more than two weeks worth of contentious debate voiced in an ongoing exchange of e-mails, memorandums, allegations and public record requests among port and county officials.

After all that and a four-hour meeting Tuesday of the Manatee County Port Authority, the board approved a recommendation brought to its attention three weeks ago by port director David McDonald.

In an Aug. 3 memorandum, McDonald suggested the port authority form a selection committee to oversee the request for qualifications for concessionaire advisory services at Port Manatee.

The port authority agreed on this solution after McDonald and several port tenants voiced concern, for the first time in a public forum, over port authority chairman Larry Bustle’s recommendation to hire maritime consultant Paul DeMariano as a transition administrator.

“I think the authority listened to the tenants which are the most important component of the port,” McDonald said of the authority’s decision to allow a selection committee to evaluate the concessionaire applications. “Without the tenants you have no jobs, you have no cargo, you have no revenue.”

Port Manatee tenants brought before the port authority a joint statement in which they said they were concerned and confused by the board’s desire to hire a transition administrator.

Those who signed the joint statement included some of Port Manatee’s top tenants including Gearbulk, Del Monte, Kinder Morgan, Logistec, SeaBridge, Liberty Terminals and Federal Maritime.

“We find it a bit redundant if you’re going to have an advisor for an advisor when there’s already an advisor on the staff that the county’s paying for,” said Chris Sheils, general manager of Gearbulk.

R.K. Johns & Associates, a New Jersey-based port consulting firm is paid $98,000 a year to advise Port Manatee and the port authority.

The port authority is seeking concessionaire advisory services to research the business potential Port Manatee might see if it changes its business model by hiring an outside company to manage terminal leasing operations that the port currently manages.

The concessionaire advisory services are expected to cost $250,000.

McDonald cautioned the port authority about the importance of keeping open communication with tenants on business matters.

“I ask you to listen to your tenants,” McDonald said. “They are the life of this port, they are your future. I implore you to restore that level of confidence in your tenants.”

Larry Bustle, chairman of the port authority, defended his proposal to hire DeMariano as a transition administrator. Bustle said DeMariano’s more than 30 years of port experience would be fitting for him to come on as an advisor to recommend a candidate for concessionaire advisory services from the applications that are due Sept. 15.

“My thinking is we need some sort of expert advisor to advise this body on decisions we need to make and how to make them,” Bustle said. “It’s important to note that the transition advisor I’m talking about is not to select or transition to a new port director. This is merely to help us transition to a concessionaire.”

Instead those that will be charged with overseeing the request for qualifications on the concessionaire advisory services are clerk of court Chips Shore, county administrator Ed Hunzeker, Port Manatee consultant Peter Keller, a port tenant and McDonald. The selection committee will review applications for the concessionaire advisory services that are due Sept. 15 and will make a recommendation for the authority to vote on.

In other news, the port authority briefly discussed a succession plan for McDonald, who will retire Jan. 31, 2012. McDonald proposed the authority consider hiring a national firm to recruit for a new executive director who would work alongside him for about three months prior to his retirement.

McDonald enrolled in the state’s Deferred Retirement Option Program about three years ago and intended to notify the port authority a year before his retirement.

“Three to six months is usually the standard,” McDonald said. “I’m giving the board three times the average time it takes for an appropriate transition.”

Former Vice President Gore is calling for major rallies to protest congressional inaction on climate change.

In a post on his personal blog headlined “The Movement We Need,” Gore linked to and quoted from an Australian wire service report that “tens of thousands of protesters … have taken to the streets across Australia to urge the major political parties to take action on climate change.”

“Across the world, when politicians fail to take action to solve the climate crisis, people are taking action,” Gore wrote.
He added after excerpting the news report: “It is my hope we see activism like this here in the United States.”

Gore noted he trained activists in Australia to deliver the slideshow that formed the basis for the documentary film that won him an Academy Award. A representative of Gore’s Alliance for Climate Protection addressed the rally in Sydney.

Gore has in recent weeks stepped up his criticism of the Senate for its inability to pass a comprehensive energy and climate bill that would put a price on carbon. In a conference call with environmental activists last week, he reportedly said “the United States government in its entirety, largely because of the opposition in the United States Senate to taking action on clean energy and a solution to the climate crisis, has failed us.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said that a proposed Islamic center in New York City was a local issue and that the opposition to the center was worth investigating.

Pelosi told local reporters on Tuesday that the decision over whether to proceed with building an Islamic center, which includes a mosque, near the site of the 9/11 attacks should be left up to the local community.

“I think everyone respects the right of people in our country to express their religious beliefs on their property,” she told KCBS radio in San Francisco. “The decision, though, as to how to go forward in New York is up to New York.”

Pelosi is the only high-ranking House Democrat to comment on the mosque at this point, though her approach and tone were markedly different from that taken by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), who on Monday endorsed moving the proposed mosque elsewhere.

President Obama has backed the right of developers to build the mosque, though the White House has emphasized that doesn’t constitute an endorsement of the building.

Pelosi pointedly referred to the controversy as “a zoning issue in New York City,” sidestepping the political and religious debate it has sparked since Obama first commented on the matter Friday night.

Republicans have run with the issue since then, pressing Democratic candidates and incumbents to say where they fall on the issue. Reid came out in opposition to the mosque only after Sharron Angle, his Republican challenger this November who’s waging a tough bid to unseat him, put the heat on his campaign to say whether he thinks the mosque should be pursued.

The Speaker questioned what was motivating the political opposition to the mosque, suspecting that the issue might be being “ginned up” to help Republican candidates.

“There’s no question that there’s a concerted effort to make this a political issue by some,” she said. “And I join those who have called for looking into how … this opposition to the mosque [is] being funded.

“How is this being ginned up that we are here talking about Treasure Island, something we’ve been working on for decades, something of great interest to our community, as we go forward to an election about the future of our country, and two of the first three questions are about a zoning issue in New York City?” Pelosi said.

Pelosi also said she was unconcerned that the issue might be used politically against Democrats, and said she would look to her members from New York to guide her on the issue.

“I look to my colleagues in New York — some of them have different views on the subject — to work it out,” she said.

Many Democrats and Republicans running for Congress this year are hiding their party affiliations.

About one-third of Democratic and GOP candidates in battleground House races do not openly reveal which party they represent, according to a review by The Hill of candidate websites.

The Hill analyzed the homepages and bios of the candidates in races identified by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report as competitive.

The results indicate that Democrats are feeling the wind at their faces this midterm election and that the anti-establishment mood of the electorate has GOP candidates wary of embracing their party as well.

While most campaign experts anticipate a Republican wave in November, they point out that polls show the Republican Party is still suffering from President George W. Bush’s unpopular last term.

Republican nominees were slightly more likely than their Democratic opponents to display their party affiliation on their homepages. Of the 46 races reviewed, 22 Republicans and 19 Democrats made some reference to their party affiliation on the homepage of their campaign website.

For example, Democratic Rep. Glenn Nye of Virginia bills himself as “an independent voice, for a change.” House GOP hopeful Alan Nunnelee’s (Miss.) website says he hopes to be a “true conservative” in Washington.

The numbers reflect a sharp turnaround from the 2006 midterm campaign, in which Democrats took control of both chambers of Congress.

A similar analysis by The Hill in 2006 found that only 25 percent of Republicans in competitive contests displayed their party affiliation on their homepages. Roughly half of Democrats in such contests had their party affiliation on their homepage in 2006.


Among the key Democrats who don’t mention their party on their homepage or bio pages are Rep. Chet Edwards (Texas), a subcommittee chairman whose district was won by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) in 2008 with 67 percent of the vote.

 Among Republicans, Rep. Charlie Dent (Pa.) doesn’t mention his party on his homepage or bio page. Dent, whose district was won by President Obama by 13 percentage points in 2008, labels himself an “independent thinker.”

 The Hill’s rundown excludes some House races whose nominees had not yet been determined.

In the most competitive Senate races whose party nominees have been decided, five of nine Democrats and four of nine Republicans showed their party affiliation on either their homepage or bio page.

There are also many candidates running for both the House and Senate who do not mention their party in campaign ads.

New-media strategist Josh Koster said the results stem from an anti-establishment mood that has damaged both parties’ brands. Increased political polarization and growing concerns about the deficit among voters have contributed to that mood, he said. 

“I think the anti-establishment sentiment is causing both sides to downplay the party brand,” Koster said. “The fact that the deficit is on average voters’ minds is causing both sides to react to that.”


Democratic nominees who don’t list their party are far more likely to tout their political “independence,” fiscal conservatism or bipartisan track records. Republicans who don’t list their party, meanwhile, are more likely to bill themselves as conservative political outsiders.

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spokesman Ryan Rudominer said many Republicans are afraid to show their party because the Republican brand has a lot of baggage of its own.

“House Democrats are independent voices for their districts,” Rudominer said. “There’s a reason why the Republican brand remains so toxic — a key difference from 1994. Republicans are offering the exact same failed economic agenda of George W. Bush.”

Some Democrats in highly competitive contests, such as Rep. John Adler (N.J.), bill themselves as fiscal hawks. Others, like Reps. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (S.D.), Patrick Murphy (Pa.) and Joe Donnelly (Ind.), mention their membership in the “fiscally conservative” Blue Dog Coalition without noting that it’s a Democratic group. 

National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Greg Blair called the Blue Dog and independent labels “meaningless,” saying many candidates who use the label have voted yes on healthcare reform, the stimulus and other Democratic items he says are adding to the country’s fiscal problems.



“They’ve checked so many boxes for Nancy Pelosi and their party leadership that in order to save their careers they’re fleeing as quickly as possible,” Blair said.

Republicans who didn’t list their party ID also bill themselves as fiscal hawks, or as “true conservatives” who would fight to reduce the size of government.

Some Democrats and Republicans proudly display their red or blue colors.

Democratic Reps. Mary Jo Kilroy (Ohio), Betty Sutton (Ohio) and Paul Kanjorski (Pa.) put their party affiliation in website logos that appear on every page. GOP candidates Steven Stivers (Ohio) and Mick Mulvaney (S.C.) also have banners touting that they’re Republicans.

White House Energy Adviser Carol Browner said Sunday that while the Obama administration is “deeply disappointed” that an energy bill was unable to make its way through Congress, the president has not given up hope that it can get done this year.

In an exclusive interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Browner was asked whether the president has conceded defeat on energy legislation.

“Not yet,” Browner said. “The Congress is coming back and we will continue to see if we can get legislation. We passed it in the House and we will continue to work in the Senate.”
Asked if Democrats could potentially get it done in a lame-duck session, Browner responded, “Potentially.”

As for the ongoing clean-up effort in the Gulf, Browner wouldn’t comment on whether the government will pursue criminal negligence charges against BP, but she did say she expects the company will be held accountable to the full extent of the law.

“BP will be held absolutely accountable,” she said. “There will be a large financial penalty.”

The government is also confident in its own estimates of the total amount that flowed into the Gulf as a result of the spill. The government puts that number at 4.9 million barrels, according to Browner — a figure that BP is likely to dispute.

She said the company has been silent on the figure, “but that doesn’t matter.”

Browner also sounded supportive of the idea of returning as much as 80 percent of the penalty dollars paid by BP directly to the Gulf Coast states. That’s the number proposed by several lawmakers from the region.

Browner said that number “makes a lot of sense,” but stopped short of saying the president was committed to that specific percentage.

The Obama administration also said last week that more than 70 percent of the oil that spilled into the Gulf is already gone, but that has been disputed by some scientists and other environmental experts.

Browner defended the government’s clean-up efforts, noting that just because the administration is touting the early results of the clean-up, that doesn’t mean it’s ignoring the potential for long-term environmental impacts.

“No one is saying ‘don’t worry,’” she said. “Right now, we’re saying the tests show nothing of concern.”

Congress will face several controversial defense issues when it returns from the summer recess, beginning with the annual defense spending bill, the industry’s bread and butter.

A crucial test for defense lobbyists, companies and lawmakers alike will be how many earmarks make it into the Senate’s version of the bill. The Senate this year appears to be the only conduit for for-profit firms and their congressional benefactors to add funding for projects the Pentagon has not requested.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), who also leads the defense-spending panel, is expected to take up the Pentagon’s fiscal 2011 budget in September.

House Democrats allowed earmarks only for nonprofits, and House Republicans instituted a moratorium on all types, with only a few GOP members breaking that pledge. As a result, pet projects were cut in half in the 2011 spending bill as compared to the previous year, according to an analysis by The Hill and Taxpayers for Common Sense.

Conference negotiations with the Senate may be intense over the earmarks, testing the resolve of Rep. Norm Dicks (D-Wash.), the new defense appropriations chairman, and Rep. David Obey (D-Wis.), the retiring Appropriations chairman, to keep pet projects only for nonprofits in the final defense bill.

The Senate panel is not expected to approve funding for an F-35 Joint Strike Fighter alternate engine, which the Pentagon does not want and which has prompted a veto threat from administration. That sets up a clash with the House: Dicks couldn’t fend off the second engine’s supporters when his panel approved the 2011 appropriations bill in July. The full House Appropriations panel is also likely to back the $450 million for the GE-Rolls-Royce-made alternate engine.

It’s unclear whether the Pentagon’s 2011 budget will be in place on time — by Oct. 1. Congressional sources have said Congress may not approve the final defense bill before the November elections, forcing a continuing resolution that would fund the department at 2010 levels.

The Senate is also poised to take up the massive defense policy bill in September — usually seen as must-pass legislation because it carries critical policies for the Pentagon, including the yearly authorization for the military’s pay raises and benefits. Perhaps the most polarizing issue this year is the repeal of the Pentagon’s “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which bans openly gay people from serving in the military.

John McCain (Ariz.), the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, on Thursday indicated he would set up hurdles to Democratic leadership efforts to bring up the 2011 defense authorization bill for a vote in September. He opposes repeal of the “Don’t ask” law as well as a provision in his committee’s bill that would repeal the ban on abortions at military hospitals if they are paid for with private funds.

Supporters of the “Don’t ask” repeal are pressing Congress to act while Democrats still hold majorities in both chambers. The defense authorization bill containing the repeal provision is unlikely to move forward in the Senate without 60 votes in favor — a level of support that may be unreachable after the midterms.

Another issue likely to ignite floor debate is a provision mandating that the president deploy 6,000 National Guard troops to the Southwest border. McCain backs the provision — his state of Arizona has seen some of the worst violence related to the drug trade from Mexico — but Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), the panel’s chairman and the manager of the bill, believes it would be unprecedented for Congress to direct the commander in chief to send troops to a specific location.

Levin has vowed to fight the provision on the floor or in conference negotiations with the House, which did not include such a provision.

Separately, the Obama administration is fighting a $1 billion cut in its $2 billion request for U.S. military training of Iraqi security forces.

“Some of us feel pretty strongly about this issue: that it’s time — given the amount of money that Iraq is taking in oil revenue and the fact they cut their own defense budget in half in the parliament — it’s kind of hard to justify putting billions of dollars in for the Iraq army,” said Levin, who has vowed to fight the cut, in May.

Conference negotiations with the House may be drawn out too, particularly because Levin is the only one of the Big Four — the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Armed Services panels — who supports repeal of “Don’t ask, don’t tell.”

Also, the F-35 alternate engine could keep lawmakers arguing, as was the case last year when the Senate did not include funding for the GE-Rolls-Royce engine.

Elena Kagan was sworn in as the 112th justice on the Supreme Court on Saturday.

In a private ceremony at the Supreme Court, the former solicitor general became the fourth female justice in history and the third woman serving in the current court’s makeup.

Kagan follows tenures at Princeton, Oxford and Harvard law schools to become the first female dean of Harvard’s law school program.

The confirmation came after a contentious battle in the Senate, which is charged with approving justices. Democrats defended her against charges of extremism, while many Republicans decried her lack of judicial experience. The National Rifle Association opposed her nomination.

Kagan was sworn in after being confirmed by a 13-6 vote on the Senate Judiciary Committee and a 63-37 vote on the Senate floor on Thursday.

Chief Justice John Roberts administered Saturday’s oath, which allows Kagan to immediately begin reviewing cases and emergency appeals.

Kagan, who has never served on the bench, had been President Obama’s solitcitor general — arguing several cases before the Supreme Court — before the nomination last year.

In a rare Friday reception at the White House, Obama feted the newly confirmed Kagan.

“I think we can agree that Justice Elena Kagan has a pretty nice ring to it,” Obama said of his second successful appointment to the court.

Kagan, on Friday, thanked Obama for trusting her enough to nominate her to the Supreme Court and pledged to fulfill an “obligation to uphold the rights and liberties afforded by our remarkable Constitution” and “to provide what the inscription on the Supreme Court building promises: equal justice under law.”

Roberts administered two oaths on Saturday. One recited was the oath as described by the Constitution during a private ceremony in a conference room at the court with only her family present, the other was in the presence of reporters.

Another ceremony is coming: Roberts plans to install Kagan again at the start of the court’s fall work schedule Oct. 1.