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LaWanna Loxley of Preble County feels powerless on the sidelines watching Washington debate the war in Iraq and its costs.

Her 21-year-old son, Lucas, an Army specialist, already has served one tour in Iraq and expects to go back in August.

On Monday, as President Bush proposed spending billions more to fight the war in Iraq, she struggled to make sense of what it all means, especially for the troops.

"I want them to come home," said Loxley, 49, of Campbellstown. "But if they are not going to come home, they need to give them the money to keep them protected and safe."

Her husband, Lynn, 55 — once "gung-ho" about the war but no longer — is concerned about funneling billions more dollars into a war he believes "we're not winning."

The Loxleys are one of the thousands of military families who have a personal stake in the sea of numbers coming out of Washington. Families like theirs will be "hanging in the middle," they say, when the budget turns into a battle in Congress.

President Bush's 2008 budget request includes $624.6 billion in defense spending.

That includes $481.4 billion to run the Defense Department in the budget year beginning Oct. 1 — an 11.3 percent increase over what Congress approved for this year and a 62 percent increase over 2001.

The administration said the funding would "ensure a high level of military readiness as the department develops capabilities to meet future threats, defends the homeland and supports the all-volunteer force and their families."

The Pentagon said the $141.7 billion in anticipated war costs for 2008 include not only the cost of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan but also the cost of repairing, replacing or replenishing equipment lost in combat by the active-duty military as well as the National Guard and Reserve.

The budget proposal would provide a 3 percent increase in basic military and civilian pay.

In a press briefing in Washington Monday, Ohio's Rob Portman, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, said the administration is going further than it has in the past to show the full cost of the Iraq war.

"This is our good-faith effort to be as transparent as possible in what we anticipate the needs will be as far out as we can possibly and reasonably project," he said.

Bush's budget proposal also includes $84.4 billion for the Department of Veteran Affairs, a 13.3 percent increase.

But U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, said funding for veterans remains inadequate. In a statement released Monday, Brown said Ohio's 982,000 veterans could be hurt by funding shortfalls.

The budget requests approximately $34.2 billion for veterans' health care, a 6 percent increase over the 2007 funding level of $32.3 billion.

Joanna Kuebler, Brown's communications director, pointed to a study by a committee of House and Senate members that said, "Without adequate funding, the VA health care system will find it more difficult to provide quality care for Ohio's 982,000 veterans and troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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