'Here it is, Mr. President, A Budget With No Numbers'' By Kristi Keck (CNN) -- House Republicans on Thursday said they have come up with an alternative proposal to the president's budget, following criticism from Democrats that they have become the "party of no." "Two nights ago the president said, 'We haven't seen a budget yet out of Republicans.' Well, it's just not true because -- Here it is, Mr. President," said House Minority leader Rep. John Boehner, as he held up a booklet that he said was a "blueprint for where we're going." The details of the GOP budget will be presented on the House floor next week, said Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin. "We're going to show a leaner budget, a budget with lower taxes, lower spending and lower borrowing," Ryan said. President Obama and other Democrats have accused the Republicans of offering only criticism and no solutions when it comes to Obama's budget.Watch GOP leaders unveil their 'leaner' budget ยป Earlier this month, the Democratic National Committee launched a "party of no" clock that was counting the time between the announcement of Obama's budget and the presentation of a Republican alternative. Boehner on Thursday called Obama's record $3.6 trillion budget "completely irresponsible." "Our plan curbs spending, creates jobs and cuts taxes, while reducing the deficit," said Boehner, R-Ohio. Read the GOP outline (pdf) Asked where the cuts would be coming from, Boehner said, "We'll wait and see next week." Rep. Mike Pence, R-Indiana, said Wednesday he hoped Congress would adopt the GOP alternative, but admitted, "It's not likely." But, Pence said, he will always believe "that a minority in Congress plus the American people equals the majority." "We intend to take our case for fiscal discipline, growth and tax relief to the American people from sea to shining sea and if the American people will rise up, anything is possible on Capitol Hill," Pence said. White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs on Thursday laughed off the Republican's proposal, joking that their blueprint has more pictures of windmills than charts. "It's interesting to have a budget that doesn't contain any numbers. I think the 'party of no' has become the 'party of no new ideas,' " he said at the daily briefing. Obama defended his budget at an online town hall meeting Thursday, saying, "It's a budget that cuts the things we don't need to make room for the investments we do, a budget that cuts the massive deficits we've inherited in half, by the end of my first term, and offers a blueprint for America's success in the 21st century." Obama maintains that his budget -- and its big investments in health care, energy and education -- are essential to economic recovery. Facing objections to his proposals, Obama said Tuesday that "the critics tend to criticize, but they don't offer an alternative budget." Democratic strategist and CNN political contributor Paul Begala reiterated that idea, saying Republicans weren't doing anything productive. "Now the Republicans have what we Texans call the chutzpah to criticize Obama for doing too much," Begala wrote in a commentary for CNN.com. "But where are the Republicans?" Begala wrote. "Doing nothing but complaining. Unless and until they do offer an alternative, they really have no right to whine about the president. For now at least, GOP stands for 'Got 0 Plans.'" Read the commentary But Republicans in Congress aren't the only lawmakers objecting to Obama's budget. Some centrist Democratic senators, whose support is critical to passing the legislation, have raised concerns about the long-term impact of the president's spending plan on the federal deficit. In a letter to the Senate Budget Committee dated Tuesday, 12 of the 16 members of the centrist Senate Democratic coalition -- which calls itself "the moderate Dems Working Group" -- expressed grave concerns about the direction of the president's budget. Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, D-North Dakota, trimmed the president's proposal in response to congressional projections showing larger-than-expected budget deficits over the next several years. "The president is exactly right in terms of his priorities for the country," Conrad said Thursday on CNN's "American Morning." "Reducing our dependence on foreign energy, focus on excellence and education, and health care reform. Those are the key priorities for the country as well as dramatically reducing the deficit but, look. We've had a new forecast come out that said we've lost $2.3 trillion of revenue in the next ten years, so obviously we have to make adjustments to his budget," he said. Conrad said he had preserved the president's major initiatives in education, energy and health-care reform in the wake of "new realities" on finances without sacrificing the administration's deficit reduction goals. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Wednesday he is confident the full Senate will pass Conrad's version of the budget next week. Publicly, the administration has tried to minimize differences between Obama's budget proposal and changes sought by congressional Democrats. The "House and Senate budget committees are taking up resolutions that are fully in line with the president's key priorities for the budget," White House Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag said in a conference call Wednesday. "There have been some changes made ... but they are 98 percent the same as the budget the president sent up in February." Later Wednesday, Obama huddled with Senate Democrats on Capitol Hill in an effort to save some major domestic priorities in his budget. With some Democrats on the fence about the budget, Republican strategist Kevin Madden said the GOP now sees an opportunity for their party to make gains. "There is a very strong degree of sticker shock, not only from Republicans up on Capitol Hill, but from Democrats," he said. "And I think what Republicans see an opportunity there ... that growing gap between his personal popularity and the popularity of his policies." CNN's Louise Schiavone contributed to this report.
On a sidenote, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs seems to be very informal in the way he makes fun of the opposition. I can't remember who it was but another prominent Repbulican criticized him on MSNBC about the way he responded to Dick Cheney's criticism of Obama. He said something about Cheney being a replacement for Limbaugh.
Apparently the charts in the doc are gold. Actual chart from Republican budget- FARK version of Republican budget charts- I think the Republicans need to hire BlameTracy.
http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/...2009&base_name=my_favorite_budget_ever#114041 MY FAVORITE BUDGET EVER. f you're having a bad day, I highly encourage you to spend some quality time with the Republican budget proposal. It's reads like what would happen if The Onion put together a budget. "Area Man Releases Proposal for 2010 Federal Spending Priorities." (Though, to paraphrase William F. Buckley, it turns out that I'd prefer a federal budget written by an area man than the first six names on the House Republican Leadership roster.) Bush, famously, described his first budget by saying, "It's clearly a budget. It's got a lot of numbers in it." Indeed it was, and did. This isn't. There are no numbers. Let me repeat that: The Republican budget proposal does not say how much money they would raise, or spend. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a "budget" as "an estimate of income and expenditure for a set period of time." This is not a budget. It talks about balancing the budget but doesn't explain how. It advocates tax cuts but doesn't estimate their costs. It promises to cut programs but doesn't name them. The threat going around the Capitol is that some impish Democratic chairman will ask the CBO to try and score the Republican proposal. The health care section, for instance, says that Democrats propose "nearly $1 trillion" in health care spending as a "downpayment" on reform. The actual number is $634 billion, which someone who's more familiar with, you know, numbers, might have characterized as "more than $600 billion," or, alternately, "$634 billion." The Republicans say that "the prime focus of [the Democrats] agenda is the establishment of a government-run health insurance plan," a policy idea that doesn't appear in the President's budget. They say that the Lewin Group has analyzed this policy that doesn't exist and found that it will force three out of four Americans onto government-run health care (the Lewin Group analyzed the Economic Policy Institute's proposal, which is not the President's budget). And so on, and so forth. The Republican proposal, as you might expect, doesn't actually have a health care plan. But it does have this: "Republicans will be on the side of quality versus mediocrity, affordability versus unsustainable debt, and freedom of care versus bureaucrats in control. And we will be on the side of patients, doctors, and the American people." They are also in favor of good things rather than bad things, moving forward rather than going backwards, the hobbits rather than the orcs, and always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom. That said, the GOP does understand that some voters might be looking for specificity on their health plan. So they included this graphic: It's like someone showed them a flowchart. Once. And only for a few seconds. And refused to explain it. My editor Ann Friedman just walked into the room. "It looks like they're building a budget molecule," she said. A budget molecule. Maybe that's what they were doing.
I am not sure Obama's plan is good or not, time will tell. However, I do know the current Republcian leaders in congress are clueless as to how to run a country.
its unbelievable edit: the republicans truly had their opportunity to make some noise on the budget, instead of screaming socialism and what not, they could have proposed a viable alternative. instead they played the same old election politics and they keep losing. they just don't get it. its really fascinating to watch. on the non bank regulation issue, newt is on hannity screaming communisim. its like dude, do you understand how the american people feel about the finance industry right about now. the general public does not care if you call it a power grab, they want some regulation. instead of insults, alternatives, please
When Obama said several days ago that Republicans haven't proposed an alternative, it wasn't true because the Republics later threw together their own plan? In other words, they still haven't actually proposed an alternative budget. Except for the fact that you're a minority in Congress because the majority of Americans realize that you're too inept to run the country.
The Republicans have to get rid of John Boehner as a congressional leader and spokesman. It's impossible to take him seriously. He's been on a roll since the election.
3.5 Trillion dollars is not a budget either. It's like giving my 8 year old a credit card at the mall... I do like the clown pic tho
Here's the PDF of the "proposal": http://www.gop.gov/solutions/budget/road-to-recovery-final I do think it's pretty silly to be claiming, "Here it is." But I don't have a problem in general with starting out with an outline (didn't the Obama administration do that with one or two of their plans?). Still, I'm curious to see what they come up with next week and if it really is an alternative budget that will be a good thing.
I'm VERY curious to see what they come up with. I wonder if it will include the "spending freeze" Boehner brought up a few weeks ago. Some of the stuff he says is incredibly stupid. A spending freeze during a recession/depression; that makes soooooo much sense (on another planet maybe).
