Why did our Dem Senators running for president miss the vote on abortion bill?

An important bill that would lift the Bush administration's ban on funding the United Nations Population Fund was defeated SEpt. 6, by a vote of 48-45 in the Senate Foreign Operations Approriation committee.
Link here: http://www.hartfordadvocate.com/article.cfm?aid=3189
Senators Clinton, Obama, Dodd and Biden were all absent.

I give a pass to Biden who was in Iraq and maybe Obama who was in Las Vegas giving a speech but Dodd and Clinton were in D.C. and had more flexibility.

If the stragegy is "wait it out till we're in the White House in 2008" I am still confused and disappointed. A while back I was called by Planned Parenthood Federation of America to speak to Senator Dodd's office in favor of lifting the ban, which I did as his constituent. I should have followed up but I felt certain Dodd would be supportive of the pro-family planning side, especially since the ban is based on NO evidence that its funding pays for abortions.

I don't hate Hillary or Dodd. I am truly curious and would like their supporters to explain this vote to me...

If they were asked what kind of Supreme Court justices they would want to see, would they be as direct as bush was when he was asked that question during the 2000 campaign?

is that abortion in this country should be "safe, legal and rare," which is exactly PPFA's policy.

This vote, of course, concerned international family planning, which is not as visible to most American voters as a position on Roe v. Wade, or what is left of it.

I still don't get this vote, tho.