Democrats may try to pass a bill reinstituting an Iraqi reconstruction oversight office, which Congress recently abolished, as early as this week. From the NYT: Congressional Democrats say they will press new legislation next week to restore the power of a federal agency in charge of ferreting out waste and corruption in Iraq and greatly increase its investigative reach. The bills, the first of what are likely to be dozens of Democratic efforts to resurrect investigations of war profiteering and financial fraud in government contracting, could be introduced as early as Monday morning. A new bill may even grant more authority to the office. As in the bill that the president signed, the new Senate proposal would expand the pot of money that Mr. Bowen [who leads the office] could investigate, but it would not set a hard deadline for the agency’s work to come to an end. Both the House and Senate measures extend the deadline at least into 2008, by most readings, but the House measure would also add about $2 billion — for training and equipping Iraqi security forces — to the amount that the agency could investigate, a Congressional staff member said. Representative Nancy Pelosi, the California Democrat who is expected to become the House speaker, said she would strongly support that legislation. The rest of the NYT article goes into the new Congress's oversight plans. It's worth a read. Democrats Aim to Save Inquiry on Work in Iraq