Congress, Budget Cuts | featured news

Liberals' loud objections to White House proposals for slowing the growth of huge social programs make it clear that neither political party puts a high priority on reducing the deficit, despite much talk to the contrary....

President Obama will have a bipartisan lunch on Thursday with Representative Paul D. Ryan, the Republican chairman of the House Budget Committee, and the panel’s senior Democrat, Representative Chris Van Hollen.

After their fifth budget battle in the past two years and after the sequester cuts went into effect on Friday, both sides seemed to wave the white flag and declare a political truce -- for now. President Obama, during his press conference on Friday, suggested little appetite for a showdown over government operations, which will expire later this month. “If the bill that arrives on my desk is reflective of the commitments that we’ve previously made, then obviously I would sign it because I want to make sure that we keep on doing what we need to do for the American people.”

As automated federal spending cuts take effect, projected red ink for the next decade has been reduced by about $4 trillion. But this wasn't how Democrats or Republicans wanted to do it.

The Congress is getting an earful about the big spending cuts beginning to hit government services from worried and irate constituents, including one senator's own spouse.

Speaking after meeting with congressional leaders, President Barack Obama said Friday the budget cuts slated to go into effect today are the "choice" of Republicans who stonewalled any compromise to avert them.

Across-the-board spending cuts all but certain, Republicans and Democrats in the Senate are staging a politically charged showdown designed to avoid public blame for any resulting inconvenience or disruption in government services.

While White House strategists believe that Republicans will be blamed as the cuts’ effects slowly emerge, President Obama risks political damage if Americans end up just shrugging at the reductions.

...Unlike their predecessors, today’s leaders have models on how to revive depressed economies. The example of Franklin Roosevelt, whose public investments in jobs and defense turned the U.S. economy around, and the writings of John Maynard Keynes, who demonstrated that the solution to depression is boosting demand, are plain for all to see. Seeing isn’t believing, however, when ideology dims the eye.

The nation’s capital was enveloped in a familiar kind of gridlock late Monday, as Republicans again demanded that President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats act first to put off $85 billion in automatic cuts slated to take effect on Friday.