The funding fight is shaping up as a major partisan brawl against the backdrop of an intensifying campaign season, with Republicans eager to avoid another Capitol Hill mess as they struggle to hang onto control of Congress and take back the White House next year. The bank's charter expired June 30 due to congressional inaction, a defeat for business and a victory for conservative activists who turned killing the obscure agency into an anti-government cause celebre. On a less partisan note, the Senate opens its legislative session this week with consideration of a major bipartisan education overhaul bill that rewrites the much-maligned No Child Left Behind law by shifting responsibility from the federal government to the states for public school standards. Yet Democrats who watched Republicans pay a steep political price for forcing a partial shutdown over Obama's health care law in 2013 — and come within hours of partially shutting down the Department of Homeland Security this year — claim confidence they have the upper hand in forcing negotiations. [...] it looks likely current funding levels could be temporarily extended beyond Sept.