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| OBAMA and the jolly green giant DEBT Img Via Patriot Post |
The Senate resumed consideration of S. 1323, a nonbinding Sense of the Senate resolution offered by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV). S.1323 says people making over $1 million per year should be required to “sacrifice” in resolving the budget deficit.
Later this morning, Democrats failed to get 60 votes to invoke cloture on their resolution about millionaires, by a vote of 51-49. Following that vote, the Senate voted 89-11 to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to H. R. 2055, the Military Construction-Veterans Affairs (Milcon-VA) appropriations bill, one of the annual appropriations bills that are considered by Congress.
Rumblings continue of Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell's position to
"Let the President Make the Decision to Raise the Debt Limit." Yesterday, we detailed his reasoning and various initial positive and negative initial responses.
The Wall Street Journal editors write today:
Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell said yesterday he's concluded that no deal to raise the debt ceiling in return for serious spending restraint is possible with President Obama, and who can blame him? We've never thought the debt ceiling was the best leverage for a showdown over the entitlement state, and now it looks like Mr. Obama is trying to use it as a way to blame the GOP for the lousy economy.
This may have been the President's strategy all along: Take the debt-limit talks behind closed doors, make major spending cuts seem possible in the early days, but then hammer Republicans publicly as the deadline nears for refusing to raise taxes on business and ‘the rich.’ . . . The reality is that Mr. Obama is trying to present Republicans with a Hobson's choice: Either repudiate their campaign pledge by raising taxes, or take the blame for any economic turmoil and government shutdown as the U.S. nears a debt default. In the former case Mr. Obama takes the tax issue off the table and demoralizes the tea party for 2012, and in the latter he makes Republicans share the blame for 9.2% unemployment.”
The WSJ editors point out, “This is the political context in which to understand Mr. McConnell's proposal yesterday to force Mr. Obama to take ownership of any debt-limit increase. If the President still insists on a tax increase, then Republicans will walk away from the talks.”
Roll Call noted, which National Review Online’s Daniel Foster highlighted“In the nearly two-hour-long White House meeting Monday afternoon during which leaders reviewed savings found last month by a group led by Vice President Joseph Biden, McConnell asked only one question . . . How much does the Biden plan actually cut from next year’s discretionary spending budget?’ the Kentucky Republican asked the room. Obama’s Office of Management and Budget Director Jacob Lew told him, ‘$2 billion.’ A second source close to the original Biden group confirmed this number.”
Speaking on the Senate floor today, Leader McConnell explained the conclusion he came to based on this situation: “It was at that point that I realized the White House simply was not serious about cutting spending or debt. The only thing they were serious about was putting together a plan that appeared serious but wasn’t. And they wanted Republicans to go along with it. Well, we’re not going to play that game. In the end, the White House gave us three choices in exchange for a vote to increase the debt limit: A massive tax hike, smoke and mirrors, or default. And none of these options is acceptable.
“So yesterday, I proposed a possible fourth option. A last resort if the President continues to shirk his duty to do something about our dire fiscal situation. If the White House continues to insist on either tax hikes or default, then we’d send legislation to the President that requires him to propose spending cuts greater than the debt limit increase he requests. Make the President show in black and white the specific cuts he claims to support. If he refuses, he’ll have to raise the debt limit on his own. But he’s not going to get Republicans to go along with it.”
Reactions:
Jennifer Rubin looked down the road at how things might play out, writing, “There are no tax increases in the plan. The onus is on the president to send a request for a debt-ceiling increase and the cuts to go along with it. If he doesn’t do it or if the Congress disapproves of what he sends up . . . the debt ceiling remains in place. But the Senate Democrats will have the power to sustain a veto (and thereby allow phony cuts to be used to raise the debt ceiling), right? Which 34 senators exactly are going to do this?”
On Fox News yesterday, conservative commentators emphasized that this way, the burden is on Democrats to approve more debt for their profligate spending. Laura Ingraham said, “I think we have to think long term about this. It’s not a bad thing, in my mind, to make them [Democrats] raise the debt ceiling and let the American people see what their priorities are. They want to raise the debt ceiling. Guess what, we’re going to be passing spending cuts. . . . Mitch McConnell knows you have to have a political edge in the PR war.” Dana Perino agreed, “One of the things that the McConnell plan does that we haven’t mentioned is it puts the onus on President Obama that if he wants to raise the debt limit, that is his – it’s on him.” And Stuart Varney discussed “the upside of the McConnell plan,” saying, “Number one, we will get to see the president's plan. It must be on the table. It must be spelled out.”
Appearing on Laura Ingraham’s radio show today to answer questions about his proposal, McConnell elaborated, “We hoped we could use this as an opportunity to do something important for the country, but . . . when we cannot force a result, we need to do the next best thing, and that’s clarify the differences between the parties. The Democratic Party is the party of big government, tax and spend, the party that brought the American people government-run health care. We’re not going to have any part of that. I’m not going to allow [President Obama] to push us into making a bad deal. . . . [W]e had hoped this would present an opportunity to cut spending. . . . But it looks as if it’s only going to be an opportunity for [the president] to try to entice us in to raising taxes. . . . I’m not going to be a part of turning the Republicans into tax collectors for the welfare state. [President Obama] is going to try to keep government spending at this huge level in perpetuity and try to entice us into driving taxes up to try to finance it. And we’re not going to make that deal.”
Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today released the following statement urging the House to pass a bill cutting hundreds of billions out of the 2012 budget attached to increasing the debt ceiling:
"The House needs to do its job, pass an increase in the debt ceiling attached with hundreds of billions of immediate cuts to the 2012 budget, and send it to the Senate. Then, if there needs to be anyone to blame, it will be Harry Reid if he doesn't pass a bill in the Senate, or Obama if he refuses to sign the bill that ultimately passes. But Republicans need to keep their word and attach big spending cuts to the debt ceiling increase — and pass it. . . .If Obama wants to increase revenue, why does he want to increase taxes?, Obama wants you to eat your peas and pay more in taxes.
"We need to cut spending now. The Ryan budget plan that passed the House will not accomplish a balanced budget for 26 years. We don't have 26 years to get our fiscal house in order. Within days of the House passing the well-intentioned Ryan plan, S&P downgraded its outlook on U.S. debt from stable to negative. Soon thereafter, Moody's threatened to do the same. The Social Security and Medicare trustees then reported that the trust funds will be exhausted much sooner than they thought just a year ago. And the debt will still rise to $26 trillion by 2021, with annual gross interest payments well over $1 trillion by then as interest rates return to their historic norm of 5 percent.
"In light of these new facts, Republicans have every reason in the world to be more aggressive. If they capitulate now, they will be surrendering any credibility they have left on this issue. They need to take a stand, and surely the American people will stand with them."
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