As Capitol Hill enters a critical 48-hour stretch, the sense on the Hill is that momentum is gaining, however incrementally, for a supercommittee deal on deficit reduction. Negotiations kicked up a level as House Speaker John Boehner met with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid Tuesday morning. But whatever deal Reid and Boehner may strike, it will almost certainly need bipartisan support in both chambers. Enter the minority.
As the broad strokes of the debt ceiling deal began to leak out over the weekend, progressive groups filled reporters’ inboxes with outraged e-mails. “Seeing a Democratic President take taxing the rich off the table and instead push a deal that will lead to Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefit cuts is like entering a [...]
Washington’s debt-ceiling talks have entered a new and desperate phase. With two weeks to go until the U.S. begins to cut government services to avoid defaulting on its credit obligations, negotiators are further apart on a plan to stem the nation’s deficits than they have ever been. Spring talks led by Vice President Joe Biden [...]
A day after a testy exchange between Barack Obama and Eric Cantor capped debt-limit negotiations at the White House, Democrats launched a coordinated attack against the House Majority Leader, portraying him as a primary obstacle to ongoing effort to reach a deal to raise the U.S.’s borrowing authority by the August 2 deadline. “Eric Cantor [...]
As the U.S. hurtles toward a potential debt-limit default that would shake the fragile economy, the chasm between the two parties widened on Tuesday, as Republican opposition to tax increases calcified and Democrats bristled at the inclusion of cuts to entitlement-program beneficiaries without “shared sacrifice” from the wealthy. After meeting for more than 90 minutes [...]
At Thursday’s White House meeting between President Obama and congressional leaders, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner laid out in stark terms the awful economic repercussions of allowing the debt ceiling to lapse. Everyone in the room agreed that defaulting on U.S. debt would be disastrous and that something must be done. At that point, Nancy Pelosi [...]
Forgive House Democrats if they’re fuming a bit about the hairpin turn in the debt-limit negotiations. Reports that the White House is willing to consider cuts to entitlement programs as part of a grand bargain that far exceeds prior proposals caught them by surprise. At a briefing with reporters Thursday afternoon, House Minority Leader Nancy [...]
The White House turned its mid-day briefing into a press conference about the massive oil spill in the Gulf. Clues about how the mess will play politically are beginning to seep out. Janet Napolitano, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said the leaking underwater oil well is a “spill of national significance” as the [...]
The passage of health care reform hasn’t been easy for the GOP. But there is a silver lining (though, some Republicans might argue that encouraging their party chairman is not exactly in the Party’s best interests): Michael Steele has finally figured out a way to raise money. The RNC’s webite, www.firenancypelosi.com, which depicts the Speaker as [...]
