Obama to propose short term package to put off spending cuts [at 1:15 EST]--LIVE THREAD

Reuters via nbcnews.com ^ | February 5, 2013 | Reuters

[Joe Boucher]

don’t deal with this negro prick.

[kcvl]

John Boehner throws cold water on Obama sequester plan

Speaker John Boehner is signaling he will not accept revenue increases that President Barack Obama is expected to propose to delay the automatic spending cuts that take hold at the beginning of March.

“President Obama first proposed the sequester and insisted it become law,” Boehner said in a statement. “Republicans have twice voted to replace these arbitrary cuts with common-sense cuts and reforms that protect our national defense.

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/02/boehner-throws-cold-water-on-obama-sequester-plan-87197.html#ixzz2K3QZRsOc

[kcvl]

“The sequester is not something that I proposed,” Obama said during the debate in Boca Raton, Fla. “It is something that Congress has proposed. It will not happen.”

That directly contradicts a 2012 book from investigative journalist Bob Woodward

“Then-OMB Director Jack Lew, now the White House chief of staff, and White House Legislative Affairs Director Rob Nabors pitched the idea to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Woodward writes,” according to a Sept. 7 story appearing on the Politico website.

“Under the deal, which Republicans accepted after several rounds of bargaining, the federal debt ceiling was raised — staving off a potential financial crisis.”

http://dailycaller.com/2012/10/22/fact-check-woodward-wrote-that-obama-administration-proposed-sequester/#ixzz2K3RKnGej

“The president is not proposing that the sequester go away,” Zients told Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions during a Feb. 14 Senate Budget Committee hearing. “The sequester is a very important forcing function for us to do deficit reduction. So the sequester will be replaced with a balanced approach to deficit reduction.” (RELATED: Rep. Forbes says Obama holding national security “hostage” to “blackmail Republicans into raising taxes”)

[kcvl]

Whose sequester?

In the debate, Obama said he didn’t propose sequestration, Congress did. (We asked the White House for comment, but didn’t hear back.)

To determine the question of ownership, we turned to Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward’s new book The Price of Politics.

Woodward’s reporting shows clearly that defense sequestration was an idea that came out of Obama’s White House. But the intention was to force Republicans to negotiate, not to actually put the cuts into effect.

Woodward summarizes the thoughts of the Obama team: “There would be no chance the Republicans would want to pull the trigger and allow the sequester to force massive cuts to Defense.” Democrats, meanwhile, didn’t want to see their favorite domestic programs cut.

As the negotiations proceeded, Republicans seemed to think the same thing.

“Boehner told the House Republican leadership and other key members not to worry about the sequester … ‘Guys, this would be devastating to Defense,’ he said. ‘This would be devastating, from their perspective, on their domestic priorities. This is never going to happen,’” Woodward wrote.

Nonetheless, sequestration is now looming.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/oct/24/barack-obama/obama-says-congress-owns-sequestration-cuts/

[SkyPilot]

Anyone able to watch? Maybe no one did?

I watched it. I know I am in the minority here, but on this issue Obama makes more sense than House Republicans who have already decided to throw Defense on the sacrificial altar to make a point.

The Sequester is bad policy. It was Romney and the Republicans who were shouting that very message loud and clear during the campaign.

It is bad for Defense, for the economy, and for the nation. Anyone remember the 3rd Presidential debate?

Panetta went on the Sunday shows with General Dempsey and made more sense than Paul Ryan did the week before. That should be a clue to the GOP that they need to be part of the solution.

We need entitlement reform, not another $600 Billion in new cuts to a DoD that already absorbed $450 Billion in cuts. The Tea Party is a great movement. I agree with it. But the "Well, burn it all down then" approach is stupid. They are going to marginalize themselves and the movement if they stick with that.

Obama gave a HUGE hint to both parties. He told the GOP that the entitlement reform he proposed before Christmas was "Still on the table, I repeat, those offers are still on the table."

That offer included a reduction in the Social Security Cost of Living increase. A huge savings over time, and one that made Harry Reid so angry he literally burned the proposal that Obama was considering in his Senate office fireplace.

Obama is going to travel around the country to gin up support for the delay to Sequester, and the talking heads at MSDNC were going nuts, saying that also meant he was going to "go around" Congressional Democrats who have vowed to step on broken glass before they would agree to slow our nation's explosive entitlement programs.

I wonder if the Republicans will realize this is an opening, or if Boehner will retreat to the bar and waste more time formulating "Plan B Two Redux the Sequel."

[FoxInSocks]

He didn’t mention that the freaking SENATE hasn’t even brought zero’s or anyone else’s budget to a vote for 4 freaking years.

You're incorrect. Last spring the senate voted down the president's budget 99-0, and the house rejected it 414-0. In 2011 the senate voted 97-0 against obama's proposed budget.

[Owen]

You do realize that fully 1/2 of the Sequester is not DoD? It’s cuts to discretionary social programs. Why don’t you want this to proceed?

[Political Junkie Too]

Boehner reneging on his promise to return to regular order in 5... 4... 3...

-PJ

[SkyPilot]

You do realize that fully 1/2 of the Sequester is not DoD? It’s cuts to discretionary social programs. Why don’t you want this to proceed?

Believe me. If we could cleanly cut just those programs, I would do a dance. Unfortunately, our "brilliant" GOP signed off on this Faustian bargain known as the "2011 Budget Control Act" that punished Defense to a much greater degree. Paul Ryan and John Boehner could have said "no" to the formula. As it stands, the DoD takes 50% of the cuts, yet it is 17% of the budget. Worse still, almost all entitlement spending was completely exempt, and still is.

Defense is a Constitutional enterprise. You and I are smart enough to know that Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, the Dept of Education, Dept of Energy, Dept of Housing and Urban Development, Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, Section 8 Housing, and every other Federal giveaway program is not Constitutional.

But here we are. Facing this massive problem, with 3 weeks to go.

The Republicans can't just stand by and watch at least 1 million jobs (some projections are actually for 2 million jobs) disappear and Defense get gutted and declare "victory." Someone needs to wake the GOP up.

[RFEngineer]

“The Republicans can’t just stand by and watch at least 1 million jobs (some projections are actually for 2 million jobs) disappear and Defense get gutted and declare “victory.” Someone needs to wake the GOP up.”

Why do you keep using the bureaucrat-speak referring to “gutting” when it is over 10 years?

The taxpayer can’t tell the difference between a dollar spent on defense or a dollar spent on other things. We don’t have the money.

The 1,000,000 (or as you say possibly 2,000,00) job figure doesn’t pass the smell test - because it’s BS.

using a macroeconomic rule-of-thumb, $1B corresponds roughly to 7,000 jobs. $42B (the actual size of the “cut”) will be approximately 294,000 jobs.

However, those 294,000 people will not all sit idle. Some will find other gainful private sector employment, growing our tax base.

So where did you pull the 2,000,000 job figure from? your posterior orifice?

It’s simply not that big a cut. It is not significant in a $500B defense budget.

The screaming you hear are bureaucrats losing budget authority.

This is hysterics. If $42B is “gutting” the defense budget than what good does the rest of the $500B we are spending do? Will it do ANYTHING to help our National Defense?

Let’s let all the supposed “cuts” happen, including DoD.

[Nextrush]

We are going the European route with these band aids coming every few months that keep the national debt growing, but at a slower rate.

MAKE BIG CUTS TO BIG GOVERNMENT NOW AND REALLY BALANCE THE BUDGET.

Otherwise we end up going bankrupt in the end.

[mwl8787]

Concur. The sequester will only save $85 billion this fiscal year, about half of which from defense.

So be it. This is the only leverage, the only guaranteed cuts the GOP can count on.

If the GOP trades in these cuts, you can be damned sure they will get played by the RATS for alternative cuts that never materialize. The Dems have perfected this game for decades into an art form.

[Reddy]

Here is where I got my info...
http://budget.senate.gov/republican/public/index.cfm/budget-background?ID=b630d3bd-f985-4943-a87a-a746ecec6a51

From what I understand, the votes against zero’s budget were against taking it up (for a floor vote), not the actual voting on it.

[Helotes]

Are you stuck in a Keynsian mind warp? If you know of a way to reduce government spending and not have some people lose their jobs please let’s hear about it now.

Otherwise, accept the bigger picture that the government sector can’t keep deficit spending at over $1 Trillion per year.

[SkyPilot]

Why do you keep using the bureaucrat-speak referring to “gutting” when it is over 10 years?

Dempsey: Sequestration Will Gut the Military

Joint Chiefs: Looming Cuts Would 'Hollow' Military

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates warns sequestration will harm national security

PANETTA: DEBT FIGHT COULD GUT PENTAGON

So where did you pull the 2,000,000 job figure from? your posterior orifice?

Defense Industry Says Budget Cuts May Cost 2 Million Jobs

Sequestration Puts 2.14 Million Total Jobs at Risk

Across-the-board federal cuts could cost 2 million jobs, aerosopace industry-funded report says

Sequestration Will Cost 2.14 Million Jobs, Study Says

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[SkyPilot]

You can't balance 3/3rds of the Federal budget while ignoring 2/3rds of it; and then targeting 17% of the remaining 1/3rd (which is Constitutional defense) with 50% of those cuts.

To all those who say loudly: "We are out of money!"

We sure are spending a lot of it on direct deposit checks to individuals, and none of that is addressed in this epic mess.

We just blew the entire year's Fiscal Cliff tax raise on the Hurricane Sandy pork bill.

This is obscene.

But, when the defenders of the Defense budget point out that the current course of Sequestration is wrong headed, misdirected, and does not fix our real problems, people complain.

Obama is the worst President in history. His fiscal policies are a disaster. The Democrats are Communists in power ties, and the Republicans have become the "me too!" defenders of the Entitlement state. All Sequestration accomplishes is that it punishes the innocent and allows the guilty to get a free pass.

Defense is NOT the problem. Sequestration punishes Defense the most.

What do you get about this?

[RFEngineer]

What a surprise. A bunch of bureaucrats proclaiming the end of the world, or worse should their budgets get cut.

So I suppose the 2,000,000 jobs cut are also over 10 years, just like the cuts in the budget?

so that’s only 200,000 jobs next year. We’re actually doing better than the rule-of-thumb.

For once, an upside for overcompensated government employees and contractors. We save even MORE money than we would compared to the private sector.

All of these guys who claim “gutting” should be fired and replaced with capable people who are not willing to lie to the American people simply to protect their budgets like these guys are doing.

So, what can we do with $500B? Nothing?

[RFEngineer]

LOL...

the 2 million job figure came from the Defense Industry, most of them quoting the same study.

These are the guys that can’t manage to get anything done with $500B.

Can you give me anything else?

[SkyPilot]

I figured as much from you.

You ask for facts, and when I give you 8 links that refute what you said, you wave your hand and declare your own wisdom.

We need to pray for this nation.

Psalm 46.