Free Republic

Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) says with budgets like the GOP plan, “the have-nots of this country will rise up like the people in Baltimore.” […] “What happened in Baltimore stems from deeper economic issues and if you would take a ride down the streets of some of the greatly impoverished areas of Baltimore where change has not come, where things are the same as they were 50 years ago and have been allowed to grow worse then you will understand the lack of hope of which those riots are born from.” “So are you saying, when you say ‘rise up...

House GOP Budget to Target Tax Rates By NAFTALI BENDAVID House Republicans, seizing on what they hope is a potent campaign issue in the midst of a muddled political and economic landscape, will introduce a 2013 budget Tuesday that cuts tax rates and provides for two individual brackets of 10% and 25%. The budget would end the Alternative Minimum Tax, which was originally aimed at the wealthy but which ensnares a growing number of middle-class taxpayers each year. The plan would nearly eliminate U.S. taxes on American corporations' earnings from overseas operations. The proposal, to be offered by Rep. Paul...

Rep. Paul Ryan, who has been in Congress for a little more than a dozen years, isn’t exactly an overnight success. But the Wisconsin lawmaker’s new status as unassailable GOP economic guru elevates the seven-term Congressman to a level that may be dangerous both for him and his party. More than a few conservatives, from intellectual-turned-kingmaker Bill Kristol to writer and talking head Jonah Goldberg, have already urged Ryan to run for the White House next year. Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin has written that “there is no good reason for Ryan to avoid a presidential run,” while House Majority...

Via Ricochet, here’s a nice clip that I’m going to call “Why I Drink.” To get in the proper frame of mind for viewing, fetch yourself an alcoholic beverage and sip slowly while comparing the increase/decrease numbers in this new poll from Pew:Not until we reach the last line do we find a plurality in favor of cutting spending, and even that’s exceeded by the combined number who want to keep humanitarian aid the same or even increase it. No wonder Obama thinks a spending freeze is good enough: The public quite clearly agrees with him.As for tea partiers, yes,...

WASHINGTON — Top White House advisers on Sunday challenged Republicans to offer alternatives and not simply criticize administration approaches, as Congress prepared to return from a two-week recess and take up a charged agenda centered on core Obama objectives. “You have to come constructive,” Rahm Emanuel, the White House chief of staff, said Sunday, “and when you’re the party of no, when you’re the party of never, when you’re the party of no new ideas, that’s not constructive.” He urged Republicans, among other things, to provide a plan for energy independence....But speaking on ABC’s “This Week,” Mr. Emanuel he would...

Republican weekly response slams Obama budget from Rep. Paul Ryan

Leadership: The congressional Republicans' recovery plan makes 100 times more sense than the tax-and-spend excess the White House and Congress will steamroll into law. But those in power won't give it a glance.During both the recession of the early 1980s and the post-9/11 economic downturn, Washington successfully used big tax cuts to revive the economy. This time the other party is running both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, and we're getting some different medicine: trillions upon trillions of taxpayers' dollars spent, a reneging on the president's promise not to hike taxes on the middle class and the poor, and expiration of...

Here is a report on the release of a Republican budget alternative yesterday that does provide details and numbers. As the report indicates, it has no chance of passage, but it does answer the President's charge last week that Republicans provide no alternative. The GOP proposal would freeze spending in many areas for five years, make the Bush tax cuts permanent, and reform Medicare to save money. . . . . . . (Watch Video)

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Former Republican presidential candidate John McCain is unveiling his own Republican budget alternative, which he says brings the debt and deficit lower than Democrats' proposals. Unlike Republicans in the House, Senate GOP leaders opted out of crafting an alternative budget, and instead plan to offer their ideas with amendments to the Democrats budget. But McCain clearly disagrees with that approach.

Today, the House of Representatives will consider two budget plans that represent dramatically different visions for our nation's future. We will first consider President Barack Obama's plan. To be clear, this is no ordinary budget. In a nutshell, the president and Democratic leaders in Congress are attempting to bring about the third and final great wave of progressivism, building on top of the New Deal and the Great Society. So America is placed in a special moment in our history -- brought about by the deep recession, Mr. Obama's ambitious agenda, and the pending fiscal tidal-wave of red ink brought...

These are difficult times in the life of our nation. Unemployment is at 9.4 percent in Indiana, and still higher in many of the counties I represent. I've seen the impact of this recession firsthand, meeting with farmers and small business owners throughout my district. They are in survival mode, making tough choices and practicing the kind of fiscal restraint necessary to get their businesses, families and farms through these tough times. The Hoosiers I've met with are making sacrifices when it comes to their own budgets and want Washington to do the same. Yet, while families all across Indiana...

"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," House Minority leader Rep. John Boehner told the press March 26, holding up a blue booklet entitled The Republican Road to Recovery. “Here it is”? No, there it wasn’t. How much would the Republicans spend? No one can say. The 19-page Republican “alternative” budget contained: No spending numbersNo tax revenue numbersNo deficit/surplus levelsNo spending levels for any government agenciesNo specific budget cuts mentioned The only charts in the “budget” are the ones that...

The president has been asking for it. Today House Republicans responded, offering a budget alternative that met with instant ridicule from the White House. "It took me several minutes to read it," Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said in his daily news briefing at the White House. The punch line came in response to a question noting that the GOP alternative spending proposal "doesn't actually contain any numbers." "I think the party of 'no' has become the party of 'no new ideas,'" Gibbs continued. "The rhetoric inside the budget seems to be a road map for the failed policies that got...

<p>The state Senate on Tuesday shot down $3.7 billion in budget cuts contained in a Republican-driven spending plan, an expected action that underscored continuing divisions between and within the two parties.</p> <p>The 26-13 vote on the measure -- opposed by the Senate's majority Democrats and one Republican -- marked the second GOP budget plan California lawmakers have defeated since the fiscal year began without a budget. Assembly Democrats killed a Republican plan on July 6.</p>