Nice, if true. Wonder when all this affluence is going to trickle down to the folks who foot the bills?

"While the White House and Democratic congressional leaders try to reach a compromise on supplemental Iraq War funding, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has shown no signs of slowing her attacks on President Bush.

Appearing in Chicago Friday at Rep. Jan Schakowsky's "Ultimate Women's Power Lunch," a fundraiser hosted by the North Shore Democratic congresswoman at the Chicago Hilton and Towers, Pelosi called the war "the biggest ethical issue facing our country."

Pelosi questioned whether it was ethical to send troops into war "under a false pretense without a strategy for success," without proper equipment and training and without "demanding accountability from the Iraqi government while we dishonored our commitment to our veterans here at home."

"In the elections, when the American people were calling for a new direction, the one place where they called for it in the clearest possible way was in the war in Iraq," Pelosi (D-Calif.) told an audience estimated at about 2,000 people. "They wanted the war to wind down," Pelosi said. "Instead, the president has escalated it. He has a tin ear in terms of listening to the people and a blind eye as to what is going on in Iraq."

Earlier, Pelosi defended Democrats from GOP criticism that their now-vetoed Iraq supplemental contained a U.S. troop withdrawal timetable that amounted to a script for insurgents or Al Qaeda to take over the country, creating new opportunities for terrorism.

"We'll fight terrorism," she said. "There is absolutely no question about the Democrats commitment to fighting terrorism."

Of warnings from the White House and Republicans that Al Qaeda is actively working in Iraq and threatening the country's stability, Pelosi said that Al Qaeda wasn't present before the U.S. invasion. She said Al Qaeda represents "a small percentage of the insurgents and militias and those who are fighting there.""