Obama Back on Capitol Hill For GOP Appeasement on Stimulus
President Obama will make yet another trek to Capitol Hill to meet with skeptical Congressional Republicans today to discuss the $825 billion stimulus package peddled by the White House and Dems in Congress. Obama held bipartisan talks on the stimulus last week, including Democratic leaders in what were essentially gripe sessions for Republican leaders in the House.
There may be more of that in today’s single party sit-down. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs described the purpose of Obama’s visit as something of a fact-finding mission, to gauge the dwindling Republican support for the House plan and take in GOP ideas to kick-start the economy.
“The goal is to seek their input. He wants to hear their ideas. If there are good ideas — and I think he assumes there will be — we will look at those ideas… I think the president is genuinely serious about this.”
Besides the typical GOP concerns over “wasteful” spending and the specific programs receiving money from the stimulus, Obama will also be faced with a Congressional Budget Office report that says only two-thirds of the stimulus would be pumped into the economy withintwo years.
A week after his Inauguration, President Barack Obama will be back in the Capitol on Tuesday, courting Republican votes for his recovery program and countering fresh questions about the effectiveness of his plans to quickly pump $825 billion into the economy.
With the House slated to vote on passage Wednesday, Obama will meet there first with rank-and- file Republicans at noon and then cross the Capitol to join a Senate Republican luncheon.
The 23 page CBO report, the first full analysis by the budget office of the House bill, predicts the measure will have “ a noticeable impact on economic growth and employment in the next few years.” But the outlay rate is still slower than the administration had hoped and could feed Republican demands to either scale back the package or add more new tax cuts.
Republican lawmakers were mostly skeptical in their previews of the president’s Tuesday meetings, with demands for more control over earmarks and more tax cuts in the final stimulus package.
Republicans have been pleased with Obama’s commitment to bipartisanship, but they stress that actions speak louder than words.
Rep. Steven LaTourette (R-Ohio) said on Monday that Obama must reduce the earmarks in the stimulus bill. While Democrats have claimed the legislation does not have earmarks, others have countered that the language is written in a way to avoid attracting the “earmark” label.
Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said Obama needs to present the GOP some areas where he can give, whether it be on tax breaks or earmarks.
“It’s possible for Obama to gather Republican support,” Blunt told The Hill on Monday.
Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) said Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) had discussed the idea of Obama meeting with Republicans long before the president’s Inauguration.
“He was invited to come up and spend some time with us and talk about whatever it was he wanted to talk about,” Kyl said. “I don’t know exactly what he’ll bring up, but I’m sure there will be some comments, questions, and an exchange with him.”
Rep. Scott Garrett (R-N.J.) said Obama needs to seek more tax cuts and also suggested that he rein in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who has scaled back minority rights in the House.
Another potential roadblock facing Obama is opposition from conservative Democrats in Congress. The Blue Dogs share many pf the same concerns about the size and contents of the stimulus as Republicans. Today’s Capitol Hill visit will also be aimed at bolstering potentially flagging Dem backing for the bill.
Meanwhile, some conservative Democrats in the House, the so-called Blue Dogs, are growing more frustrated with how the stimulus bill has grown in scope over the last week.
Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) said many of his fellow Blue Dogs had “a lot of concerns” with the size of and provisions in the marked-up bill, and voiced those concerns to leadership last week.
“I think we’re kind of wandering from Obama’s vision,” Cooper said. “We shouldn’t wander too much from what the president wants. This is his vision. We should want to help him succeed.”
And if Congress keeps steering the bill in the direction of “a congressional barbecue,” as Cooper described it, then “we’re going to lose [Democratic] votes,” he said. Cooper voted against the 2008 stimulus package.
An aide to a Blue Dog leader made it clear late last week that Cooper was not speaking for the entire group. And Blue Dogs continued to suggest they were prepared to support the stimulus bill provided that promises of real, long-term fiscal reform measures are kept.
“Blue Dogs want [statutory pay-go] in short order, and they are very firm on that,” the Blue Dog aide said.
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“Rep. Scott Garrett (R-N.J.) said Obama needs to seek more tax cuts and also suggested that he rein in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who has scaled back minority rights in the House.”
And then, an unnamed aide to House Speaker Pelosi responded with, ‘rein in Nancy, them is fightin’ words.’ Although, President Obama being somewhat spineless and doesn’t like personal confrontations, sides with the R’s and has the Speaker put under “House” arrest…
Where was conservative outrage when President Bush was pushing 600 billion dollars of spending on the Iraq war.
All of that money was borrowed.
Why are Conservatives all for borrowing money to spend on training Iraq’s police and army, rebuilding bombed out schools, restoring power and drinking water , prop up Iraqs governments and paying insurgents not to fire on US troops.
But when it comes to spending money here in America they call it wasteful.
I think we should ship the Republican congress to Iraq.
They seem to have far more sympathy for poor iraqi’s than unemployed Americans.