The House of Representatives voted Friday to support the troops in Iraq but disapprove President Bush's escalation of the conflict. Republicans in the Senate on Saturday were able to block passage of a parallel resolution, taking no action.

The way the two houses of Congress have dealt with this iteration of the Iraq issue has been revealing, both in the action the House took and the Senate didn't take, and in the way the two bodies have operated.

The Senate led off discussion of the matter two weeks ago with a simple nonbinding statement of support for U.S. troops in Iraq, coupled with a rejection of Mr. Bush's plan to increase the number of those troops. Through the introduction of multiple versions of the resolution and an effort to defend the White House position by most of the Republicans, the Senate avoided a vote.

At that point, the House took up the matter, providing for each of its 435 members to make a brief statement on the question and then vote. It approved the resolution 246-182 on Friday. The vote for the resolution included 17 Republicans; the vote against it, two Democrats. The Senate then went into an unusual session on Saturday and, under the leadership of Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, used procedural tactics to dodge a vote, in which the White House position would have lost.

The House vote for the resolution is important. The House will have to approve the next, over-budget $93.4 billion in spending for the war. Rep. John P. Murtha, D-Johnstown, chairman of the defense appropriations subcommittee, has indicated that he will attach stiff conditions to approval.

The Republicans will attack any effort not to simply rubber stamp approval of the administration budget request as a lack of support for our forces in Iraq. That position is, of course, nonsense. It isn't the money for body armor for the troops that will be in play, as the Republicans charge. It is, instead, all the other fat in the Department of Defense budget. It is worth noting that government auditors last week reported to Congress that at least $10 billion of $57 billion in reconstruction contracts had been wasted in Iraq. Last week also, an American businessman was sentenced to 46 months in prison for having bribed three U.S. Army officers in return for contracts.

Mr. Bush has made it clear he intends to ignore the House resolution. The only way to make him listen is to cut off the money for his war. That is what should happen next.