WASHINGTON -- The Senate neared passage of a six-month extension of the USA Patriot Act Wednesday night, hoping to avoid the expiration of law enforcement powers deemed vital to the war on terror.

It is unclear when the House would act on the bill.

The agreement capped several days of backroom negotiation conducted against the backdrop of presidential attacks on critics of the legislation. The Patriot Act provisions will expire on Dec. 31 if the House and Senate do not act.

The extension gives critics - who successfully filibustered a House-Senate compromise that would have made most of the law permanent - more time to seek civil liberty safeguards in the law. Democrats and their allies had originally asked for a three month extension, and the Senate's Republican majority had offered a one-year extension. The final deal split the difference.

"For a lot of reasons, it made the most sense, given that there are significant differences that remain," said GOP Sen. John Sununu of New Hampshire, one of a small group of Republicans who joined with Senate Democrats to filibuster a House-Senate compromise.

Rush Limbaugh posed a good question on his show today after interviewing Idaho's Republican Senator Larry Craig who called in to clarify his vote against renewing the Patriot Act late last week: If it's good enough to extend for 90 days, or three months or six months, why in the hell isn't it good enough to extend for another four years? The blowhard Craig didn't have a good answer for that one except to say that it scared the crap out of him that Hillary Clinton might be in office to abuse it three years from now. He certainly couldn't point to any abuses in the last four years and in fact even the ACLU as much as admits there have been none. If a possible Hillary presidency is the only reason this stuffed shirt has for opposing it, it's a pretty poor one. All extending the Patriot Act for six months does is give us yet another fight to look forward to and communicates clearly to the terrorists that we have our heads up our collective asses and can't decide what we are going to do -- just the type of ambivalence an enemy loves to exploit. Extending it for six months is better than nothing, but not much.