Scheduling

The House returns at 10 a.m. for speeches and noon for legislative work, and has two main bills to consider.

Members will begin working on amendments to H.R. 1309, the Flood Insurance Reform Act. The rule approved last week makes 25 amendments in order to this bill that would allow the National Flood Insurance Program to charge higher premiums and reduce rate subsidies in an effort to remove nearly $18 billion of red ink from the program.

The Senate meets at 2 p.m., and at 5:30 p.m. is expected to hold a cloture vote on S. 1323, a sense of the Senate bill expressing support for raising taxes on people who earn $1 million or more a year.

The vote comes just hours after the White House and House Republicans announced that they remain deeply split over whether taxes should be a part of any debt-ceiling solution. House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Sunday said Republicans can't support a Democratic proposal to reduce the deficit by $4 trillion deal because that plan involves at least $1 trillion in tax increases.

Washington got hit square in the jaw this week by a terrible jobs report that can only complicate efforts to reach a debt ceiling deal, which must be reached before August 2 in order to avoid a government default and/or partial government shutdown.

Does government spending create jobs? Does cutting the budget deficit create jobs? Can raising taxes be part of the equation after such a bad jobs report? Which programs can be cut that won't hurt job creation? Does anything government does have any effect on jobs at all?

Republicans and Democrats now have just three weeks to find the answers, or more likely, struggle to reach the true grand compromise: the right ingredients in a debt ceiling, spending and tax agreement that can also be sold to voters as a jobs plan (limited snickering at the edges from partisan economists would also help).

The House returns at 9 a.m. Friday to finish work on the 2012 Department of Defense Appropriations Act, H.R. 2219. Members have debated amendments to this bill for the last two nights, but are expected today to complete that work and vote on final passage.

The House on Thursday rejected most controversial amendments to defund Afghanistan and Libya operations, and on Friday is expected to reject a handful of amendments before approving the bill.

The House adjourned at about 9 p.m. Thursday, after approving a few amendments to the Department of Defense Appropriations Act and holding some for roll-call votes on Friday.

Among other things, members voted to deny funding to African countries that support military training involving child soldiers, to prohibit funding for ground troops in Libya and to block funding for a new flight suit design. Those with more energy can review all the amendment votes so far here, but many of the major anticipated amendments on Libya, Afghanistan and Pakistan were debated and voted on earlier.

The House returns at 9 a.m. Friday for legislative work. A final vote on the DOD spending bill is expected before the House adjourns Friday.

The House adjourned shortly before 11 p.m. Wednesday night, and faces several key amendment votes Thursday on the Department of Defense Appropriations Act when it returns for legislative work at noon.

Most important are a series of votes on amendments that would defund all or part of military operations in Afghanistan. Democrats introduced several of these Wednesday.

The Senate meets at 10 a.m. Wednesday and is expected to debate a bill from Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) that calls for higher taxes on people earning $1 million a year or more.

Reid put forward the bill, S. 1323, as a way to meet Republican demands to begin considering bills related to the debt ceiling and budget deficit crises. But Republicans on Tuesday already began criticizing the bill by saying a tax hike is not the answer (in addition to noting that Reid's bill is only a sense of the Senate measure).

Both the House and Senate return next week, after the Senate originally planned a week-long July 4 recess but decided to stay to work on a debt ceiling agreement.

But while 99 percent of life may be just "showing up," it's not clear that the Senate's presence in Washington by itself will move the debt talks along in any significant way. Senate Republicans argued this week that regardless of where Senate Democrats are, they have not yet accepted that significant pending cuts need to be part of the debt agreement.

The House has planned a few key hearings during next week's abbreviated schedule, including one that will explore what Republicans say is an anti-business proposal from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

The House Education and the Workforce Committee will hold a hearing July 7 titled "Rushing Union Elections: Protecting the Interests of Big Labor at the Expense of Workers' Free Choice." That hearing will examine NLRB's proposal to change union election rules.

The House and Senate each meet in a brief pro forma session on Friday, but no business will be conducted in either chamber.

The Senate returns briefly at 11 a.m., and is due to return July 5 at 2 p.m. The next Senate vote is expected at 5 p.m. on Tuesday, on a resolution from Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) that would authorize the continued use of military force in and around Libya.