Spending Cuts, Paul Ryan | featured news

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.

This dispute is typical of election-year spin. Romney and Ryan want it both ways: credit for cutting spending without detailing what programs would suffer. That allows Obama to fill in the blanks and scare voters by warning that their favorite federally funded program will be decimated.

President Barack Obama accused Republicans on Saturday of a backward approach to education funding that would mean further teacher layoffs, in a veiled swipe at Republican vice presidential hopeful Paul Ryan, who has led a drive for domestic-spending cuts.

Well, no one can doubt anymore that Republicans are petrified that the Medicare cuts in Rep. Paul Ryan’s budget might cost them the 26th congressional district in New York, long a safe Republican seat, in the May 24 special election. It’s a classic technique in politics that if your opponent has found an issue that’s working against you, you turn the tables and declare your opponent’s position to be as bad as yours, or worse.