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Subscribe to RSSNBC’s Luke Russert reported last night: “The gulf between Republicans and Democrats on the ‘fiscal cliff’ grew larger today as the GOP dismissed the White House’s opening offer as ‘unbalanced’ and ‘unreasonable.’
The offer is seen as a major setback by Republicans, but it also signals the White House is not about to start negotiations with major concessions after winning reelection, something the president has previously been criticized for from the left.
USA Today: “House Speaker John Boehner flatly rejected a $4 trillion Obama administration plan to avoid going over the fiscal cliff that was presented by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in a private meeting Thursday. Publicly, Boehner said he is ‘disappointed’ with the offer, but he offered no details. Privately, three Republican congressional aides familiar with the president's offer cast it as an ‘outrageous’ proposal that surprised the speaker and has set back negotiations….”
Politico: “Democrats are increasingly confident that rank-and-file Republicans will cave on taxes and force House GOP leaders to pass a tax cut plan for families who earn less than $250,000.” Sen. Chuck Schumer: “You can smell the winds. When so many Republicans say, ‘Hey, we’re going to have to give into the Democrats,’ that’s how it works around here. That’s the beginning.”
To that point, Political Wire: “Rep. Chris Gibson (R-NY) ‘came up with what might be the most creative excuse yet’ for breaking his pledge not to raise taxes, Politicker reports. Gibson says ‘his district number changed from 19 to 20 during this year's redistricting process and he reasoned that the pledge no longer applies to him as it was only to the constituents under the previous district number.’”
USA Today’s Jackson notes of the negotiations: “Sit back and relax, this is going to take a while.” And: “The White House on Thursday made an offer to the GOP -- basically the same plan President Obama proposed during the election, one that emphasizes higher taxes on the wealthy as a way to reduce the nation's $16 trillion-plus debt. Republicans attacked the White House plan -- just as they did during the election -- saying it promotes tax rate hikes but fails to detail meaningful spending cuts.”
More: “Government officials may well spend New Year's Eve crunching budget numbers rather than clinking champagne glasses.”
Outside game… Major Garrett: “If there is one redeeming feature of the otherwise gutless and indolent sequestration process, it is the underappreciated component of hysteria. Already, local news stations are running “fiscal cliff” countdown clocks. Fevered curiosity over the ebb and flow of cliff negotiations is rising and may soon creep near the Kardashian or One Direction pop-culture summit.”
Democratic advantage… Ron Brownstein: “The same dynamic that powered the Democrats’ unexpected Senate gains this fall could also give the party more leverage to drive its legislative agenda through the chamber in the months ahead. At the core of the Democrats’ surprising pickup of two Senate seats was a consistent pattern. In almost every major contested Senate race, exit polls showed that the Democratic candidate won more support among voters who also backed President Obama than the Republican nominee did among voters who backed Mitt Romney.”
The revolving door keeps on turnin’… Politico looks at all the would-be/ex-congressmen and women headed for or likely headed for K Street or lobbying jobs, including Reps. Heath Shuler (D-NC), Jason Altmire (D-PA), Geoff Davis (R-KY), Mary Bono-Mack (R-CA), Connie Mack (R-FL), Charlie Gonzalez (D-TX), ex-Sen. George Allen (R-VA), Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), and GOP favorite Puerto Rico’s Luis Fortuno.
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Dang!.... GOPers keep "obstructing" the same thing... and expect different result?... what the....(bleep)...
boner is od'd... tanning salon od'd... what a waste of my taxdollars... i'm paying your "salaries and entitlements", you .... (bleep)!!!
Let's go over the cliff. The Republicans will never get elected again if we do.
Taxes did not break America. Spending did not break America. Giving our industrial base to other countries did break America. We spend a billion dollars more every day on imported products than other countries spend on our exported products. No country can survive irrational trade policies like that. We need equal trade policies.
At least for a little while longer, America still has the biggest consumer market in the world. Why not use it to support American families instead of supporting people in other countries. It is time to return to charging all suppliers of goods and services to the American market for the use of that market. If you want to use the American market to generate profits for your business you should have to pay for that PRIVILEGE.
That is how it was in the 50's and 60's when we built this great economy and that is how it should be today.
Whoever believes that the Gang Of Pigs is going to work with this President, I have a bridge in Somalia that I'm selling for cheap
I'd like to offer some entitlements that we could do with out. How about the entitlement to the oil companies? It is ridiculous that we are talking about cutting programs to America's poorest citizens while giving huge subsidies to the oil companies. Another entitlement I would like to see on the table are the entitlements of our congress. Their healthcare for life, pension for life, golden egg benefits they receive. And, they complain the unions are sucking the life out of America? Union members at least contribute to their healthcare and retirement. Lets start with those entitlements before going after our poor.
all i have to say to you about that is ... amen & that's a good start
Taxes at the rates typical in the 1990's did not break America. George W. Bush broke America with excessive tax cuts and a hugely expensive unnecessary war.
I have a question, do you think there is a possibility, that there are white
men, members of congress, the senate,the government, that are resistant
to the efforts of the President, because of his race, is that possible , that there
may be at least one that feels that way, a simple yes or no answer
no , it is purely political
Geez...hysterical are we??? Oh, that's right, I forgot...this has never, ever, happened before. Yep, both political parties have walked arm-in-arm through the muck and mire of American financial disasters singing happy songs. Of course hysterical race baiters, social warriors, socialists and communists are going to cast aspersions at the "old, white bastards". And of course the bigot, slave driving, right winger tea bagger KKK members are going to swear it's the end of the American dream.
Unknot your underwear everyone...the Republicans and the Democrats are going to work out a deal, if not before January 1, pretty quickly afterwards. The road may be bumpy and there will casualties, businesses will fail, people will be unemployed because of this (or any deal that goes forward).
Regardless of how this all works out, you can be guaranteed that people are going to be put out of work. The only way that doesn't happen is if a magic genie comes out of a bottle and solves all the problems.
America has spent more than it can produce and the bill will come due, no matter how much anyone wishes it away, we owe more than we can pay without paying a bigger percentage of our GDP.
I'm all for cutting Defense spending, close a bunch of bases, cancel ship building and aircraft procurement and shrinking the armed forces by half. The question is what do you do with all the people that'll put out of work? I'm all for cutting farm aid and oil industry subsidies, and while we're at it let's collect all the taxes we should. Let's do away with charitable deductions, mortage deductions and other props for the reality industry.
Doctors will just have to make do with less money, so let's cut reimbursements to physicians and hospitals. With the Affordable Healthcare Act ("Obama Care") we could add a rider that forces physicians to accept medicare patients and also build in incentives to recruit more physicians and nurses from overseas.
In fact we could change immigration laws, bring in more temporary workers to complete infrastructure projects at lower wages and solve our immigration problem in one fell swoop.
End the war on drugs and free up a lot of money used in law enforcement and get a lot of people out of prison (who a majority happen to be minorities), two birds with one stone (no pun intended).
Pull back from the UN and overseas commitments to lower the amount we spend in aid to other countries, defense, and reduce the irritant that we've become that lowers our profile as a target for all the crazies out there.
Just watch the timing.....politicians will be kept till the last minute so Obama can cram his wants down everyone's throat......same thing happened last time about the budget.....over holidays, WA was locked in rooms to negotiate what?
Good those politions in Washington can start earning there money... now, l hope they spent there holidays locked up and figuring fisical cliff out. Its why they wanted this job.
Poor PINKY. Elections and public opinion mean so little to you.
LOL We should do what the ultra-conservatives, Koch bros and friends, and the TP (formerly the GOP) want us to do because....because...well, because they want us to, and never mind what the voter-peasants want.
Outrageous, ridiculous, unreasonable, and soon to be law of the land. The President has all bases covered and the GOP has no way to get out of the mess they created.
Bohener haven't realized yet that Obama won the elections, who is this clown to come with a new proposal??
and everything is resumed to this:
"House Republicans offered no concessions to Obama's central demand that income tax rates be allowed to increase for the wealthiest Americans."
These GOP bloodsuckers don't care about USA, they just care about their billionaires bosses that pay all their political campaigns..
Dang, the Demoncrats are trying to beat this onto the backsides of the GOP and the Tax Payer. I don't believe that taxes will only be raised on higher earners. Eventually we will all have to pay for this run-a-way train of an administration. Get used to it folks!
H*ll this counrty needs to just fall off the face of the earth and start all over.........Politically speaking.
Hope you have a parachute...we are going over the cliff thanks to the GOP !!!
I am a firm believer that we will go over the cliff. I am not holding my breath that we won't. It will be up to the poor and middle class to fund the government benefits at the expense of our own. Poverty rates don't take into consideration taxes on your income. They look only at what you are making, not what you take home. I am well educated, I have a job, I pay taxes and I pay for health and dental and daycare and rent. After all of that, I bring home $475.00 a month or 188.75 a week. I have bills I pay (gas for the car, car insurance, phone). I am lucky if I have even $55 a month for food for my daughter and I. I don't know where else to cut spending. When we go over the fiscal cliff, with taxes going up, I will be lucky if I even have $25 a month left for food. I make too much money, so no program is available to ease the burden. This is just one person in poverty, imagine all the others who face the same problems as me.