Obama Looking at His Own 'Plan B'

[iandhr]

Source: NY TIMES

President Obama is considering a “Plan B” of his own to avert a fiscal crisis in the New Year, a bill to extend expiring Bush-era tax rates on incomes below $250,000, with a measure to temporarily suspend automatic, across-the-board spending cuts and an extension of unemployment insurance benefits, Democratic officials said Friday.

The bill would be similar to legislation already passed by the Senate, but the added measures delaying so-called “sequestration” and helping the unemployed would make it that much more difficult for Republicans to oppose, Democrats said. Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, was meeting with the president Friday afternoon to consult on ways forward. A Senate Democratic leadership aide said Mr. Reid would only move forward with the stripped-down bill to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff if Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, agreed not to filibuster it.

Asked whether he would do that, Mr. McConnell stepped onto an elevator and said “Merry Christmas.”

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/us/politics/debt-reckoning.html?hp#sha=d1bc2cc67

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Given there is a lot of conflicting information about whats going on about fiscal cliff maybe we should chill until we know whats going on for sure.

[Neatlyp]

1. Spam deleted by petronius (MIR Team)

[bucolic_frolic]

2. Stop compromising, you cannot please the Republicans

Don't cut Social Security, don't chain your COLAs, don't move
to $400,000 ... just stop trying to compromise with people
who will not compromise.

[heaven05]

3. chill?

ya think.

[high density]

4. How much longer are we going to keep kicking this down the road?

The Republicans whine endlessly about the debt and deficit that they created. At the same time they don't want to ever find a genuine balanced solution that would actually have a chance of passing through congress and getting Obama's signature. They just want to preserve tax cuts for rich people and infinite defense spending. Obama already let them get away with this a year ago, because he felt it was more important to preserve unemployment benefits and get the payroll tax cut. I hope this year he stands his ground. If people start feeling the pain in their paychecks, the Repukes will have a lot to answer for. Republicans own this shit, and the populace is clearly on the side of the Democrats.