US lawmakers press Bush to put war costs in budget

WASHINGTON, Dec 22 (Reuters) - Top lawmakers are pressing President George W. Bush to stop using a "shadow budget" to fund the Iraq war and instead list the expected costs in the 2008 spending plan he is set to unveil early next year.

Total war spending may reach $170 billion for the 2007 fiscal year that ends Sept. 30, a record.

Since the conflict began in 2003, Bush has used emergency spending bills to cover nearly all of the costs for the Iraq operation, rather than including them in the annual budget.

He has come under criticism for this practice, not only by lawmakers but also by the Iraq Study Group that recommended policy options for Iraq and said that in the interests of openness, the budget process should not be circumvented.

Three lawmakers -- one Republican and two Democrats -- wrote to Bush on Thursday telling him that the emergency bills had created an "ever-expanding shadow budget" that was obscuring Congress's oversight process and skewing budget deficit projections.

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