Republican's 2012 Budget
If last year is any indication, the Ryan Budget due to be unveiled next week is sure to leave us disappointed.
Just today, Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan told the Wall Street Journal: “I wouldn’t expect any big surprises.”
Republicans took the House majority six months ago and have done little to live up to the promises in their Pledge to America.
Today the President clearly stated Democrats’ position: we must ensure that America pays its bills, and agree to a balanced approach to reduce the deficit that includes spending and revenues. We disagree with Republicans who want to protect tax breaks for the wealthy, the oil companies, and special interests, while fighting to end Medicare and reduce the deficit on the backs of seniors and the middle class.
When Republicans took the House majority, they pledged to focus on creating jobs and growing the economy. But after six months, they still haven’t put forward a comprehensive jobs agenda. While Democrats are focused on the Make It In America agenda, a plan to support job creation and boost working families, Republicans are pursuing a partisan agenda that has the wrong priorities.
From the Democratic Whip Press Shop:
Today, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke warned against undermining our economic recovery by drastically cutting spending too quickly. Democrats agree with Republicans that we must reduce spending but we also have to ensure that spending cuts don’t harm the economy and impede job creation.
From the Democratic Whip Press Shop:
We hope House Republicans were paying attention to the ethanol vote in the Senate today, as 73 Senators—including 33 Republicans—voted to end these tax breaks.
That’s 33 Republican Senators who finally agreed that the tax code is not off limits when looking to restore fiscal discipline.
It’s clear Republicans haven’t lived up to their pledge to focus on job creation in the past, but we hope, for the sake of the American people, that this summer is different. Democrats stand ready to work with Republicans so that we can create jobs, grow the economy and enact a plan to reduce the deficit.
This week, the House passed legislation that provides our Armed Forces the resources they need to keep our country safe and support our military families. I voted for this legislation, but I have concerns about some of the parts of the bill that don’t help make our nation safer, including reopening the issue of the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” an overly broad expansion of the President’s powers to use military force, and limiting the tools in our tool box to fight terrorism...
After this week’s stunning electoral upset in Western New York, Republicans have gone into overdrive trying to defend their misguided budget plan to end Medicare as we know it and more than double costs for seniors.
Last night, voters in Western New York sent a clear message that the Republican plan to end Medicare as we know it is the wrong choice. But today, Senate Republicans chose to ignore that message and instead voted for the Republican budget that does not balance and puts insurance company bureaucrats in charge of seniors’ health care – a move that will more than double seniors’ health care costs.
This week, Senate Republicans vote on the Republican budget that makes the wrong choices for how to address our nation’s deficits: it ends Medicare as we know it, raises costs for seniors, and gives tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans.
If the United States fails to pay the bills it has incurred, it ‘would be a financial disaster not only for our country, but for the world economy.’ Those are the words of Speaker Boehner in January...
Now that the U.S. has reached the debt limit today, it is past time for Republicans to get serious and work with Democrats to ensure our nation pays its bills while laying out a path to reduce the deficit. The longer we wait to take responsible action, the more damaging it is to our economy. I agree with Speaker Boehner’s statement yesterday that an agreement doesn’t ‘have to wait until the eleventh hour.’ Businesses – and the global economy – need certainty that the U.S. will continue to pay its bills. By choosing to hold the economy hostage by risking a default on our nation’s debt, Republicans are endangering our economic recovery. I hope now that we’ve reached the debt limit, and the Treasury has been forced to employ extraordinary measures, Republicans stop putting the economy at risk and work with us to meet our obligations and set forward a serious, balanced approached to deficit reduction.
Today’s Trustees Reports show that the Social Security and Medicare programs have the resources to meet their obligations well into the next decade, but have taken a hit due to economic conditions. The programs will be solvent into the next decade, due in part to the enactment of the Affordable Care Act, which strengthened Medicare by taking significant steps to constrain cost growth through innovative delivery system and payment reforms that will increase efficiency, improve quality, and generate long-term savings for both beneficiaries and the government. According to the Trustees, Medicare’s financial outlook was substantially improved by this critical law.
After four months, its clear Republicans don’t share the American people’s priorities by failing to focus on jobs and making the wrong choices on the deficit.
While this marks the seventh straight quarter of economic growth, it is clear that more must be done to spur the economy and create jobs. To both keep the economy growing and speed up that growth, we cannot do anything that subjects the economy to unnecessary uncertainty. Yet Republicans continue to hold the economy hostage to their partisan and divisive agenda by threatening to default on our nations’ debts – despite the fact that much of the debt that’s been run up was as a result of their policies. I hope today’s news will prompt Republicans to stop putting our economy at risk. I also hope it will remind Republicans that we need to take action on job creation. It’s disappointing that after four months in the majority Republicans have failed to bring a single jobs bill to the Floor, despite their promises that it was their top priority.
But there's a paradox to Boehner's success. The speaker hasn't achieved these goals solely because of the 87 GOP freshmen elected last fall. He's pulled it off because in each case, he got help from the Democrats.
House Democrats launched a surprise procedural offensive on a budget plan Friday in an effort to put conservative Republicans on the spot – and fell just nine votes of succeeding.
House Democrats engaged in a little guerrilla warfare on the floor Friday, forcing Republicans to switch their votes at the last minute to avoid passing the Republican Study Committee’s budget.
When House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) heard Republicans were going to hold a vote on the extremely conservative Republican Study Committee budget, a lightbulb turned on in his head.
Budgets are about values and priorities – and the Republican budget makes the wrong choices, financing tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans on the backs of seniors and the disabled.
"In recent days, we have seen starkly contrasting budget plans. The plans put forward by President Obama and House Democrats are balanced approaches to getting our country out of debt while protecting investments in job creation and the future of our economy. But the Republican plan has a higher priority than balancing the budget or investing in our future or looking out for working families—its highest priority is cutting taxes even further for the wealthiest Americans...
“Today, Republicans mark 100 days in the House majority. During that time, they have pursued divisive social issues, passed bills that have no chance of becoming law, introduced a budget that would end Medicare as we know it and threatened Americans with a government shutdown. But there is one thing that Republicans have failed to do: they have failed to even consider a single bill to create jobs...