| Boehner Challenges Obama and Senate Democrats To Solve Sequester |
| Feb-14-2013 |
| Keywords: boehner, sequester, obama, senate, democrats, spending cuts, no taxes |
With just two weeks left before sequestration go into effect, Speaker Boehner on Thursday said sequester will remain in effect until Democrats offer up cuts to government spending.
House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said that the automatic budget cuts known as the sequester will go into effect unless Congress balances the federal budget over the next decade.
"I'll tell you the same thing I told my Republican colleagues at our retreat: The sequester will be in effect until there are cuts and reforms that put us on a path to balance the budget over the next 10 years. Period," Boehner said at his weekly press briefing.
Boehner has said repeatedly that while he doesn't like sequester as a means of reducing government spending, he will allow the automatic cuts to go into effect unless Senate Democrats and President Obama present a plan to avoid it that cuts spending without raising taxes.
In his State of the Union speech Tuesday, President Obama called the sequester "sudden, harsh, arbitrary cuts" that would harm vital government programs.
"These sudden, harsh, arbitrary cuts would jeopardize our military readiness. They'd devastate priorities like education and energy and medical research," he said.
Though in 2011, when Obama was perhaps feeling more politically empowered on the issue, he threatened to veto any attempt by lawmakers to delay the sequester cuts with short-term, stopgap measures. The very thing he is asking from Capitol Hill in 2013.
Boehner said Thursday that the only reason the sequester exists is because Obama insisted it be included in a debt ceiling and budget deal the two negotiated in 2011.
"This sequester was the president's idea. His party needs to follow through on their plans to replace it," Boehner said. "I've made it very clear. The sequester - I don't like it. Nobody should like it, but the sequester is there, because the president insisted it be there. Where's the president's plan to replace the sequester that he insisted upon?"
Animosity between lawmakers and military officials also flared up on during a House committee hearing on Wednesday.
Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, told Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter that the military has known for a long time the cuts were a possibility but failed to adequately plan for them.
"You are part of the problem," Bishop said. "The silence that was coming out of the Pentagon ... did not help in actually presenting to the American people what this means."
He added: "I'm sorry. There is a lot of blame to go around if we actually have to have sequestration. Don't think you're going to get out of accepting some part of that blame."
Carter defended the Pentagon's planning, saying he alerted Congress last year.
But Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va., said lawmakers have been kept in the dark until just a few weeks before the cuts are to go into effect.
"We heard over and over again when we were asking you guys what's the impact, we were hearing, `We're not doing the planning. You can't plan for chaos,"' Forbes told Gen. Raymond Odierno, the Army's chief of staff.
The committee's top Democrat, Rep. Adam Smith of Washington, urged lawmakers to prevent the cuts.
Later in the day, outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta complained about the tone in Washington, perhaps in response to the hearing.
"I don't pretend that we always make the right decisions. We make mistakes," he said. "But what I look for are members who are willing to work with us, to try to work our way through some tough issues and be able to find some solutions. We need to find solutions. We can't just sit here and bitch." |
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Posted by Lou Dobbs Staff at 3:00 PM Email to a friend |
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