Obama's budget to call for slashing oil tax breaks, boosting clean energy

[jefferson_dem]

Obama's budget to call for slashing oil tax breaks, boosting clean energy
By Andrew Restuccia - 02/13/11 02:48 PM ET

President Obama is expected to call on Congress Monday to eliminate billions of dollars in oil industry tax breaks, while setting aside money for his top clean-energy policy priorities.

Obama will send his fiscal year 2012 budget request to Congress on Monday. The budget comes as Republicans are calling for massive cuts in spending, unveiling a proposal this week to fund the government through the end of this fiscal year that would cut $100 billion in spending when compared to Obama’s 2011 budget request.

Obama’s 2012 budget request will also make major budget cuts. It will freeze domestic spending for he next five years and cut the deficit by $1.1 trillion over the next decade.

Obama’s budget request will call for eliminating a series of oil industry tax breaks. The Department of Energy estimates that such a repeal will save $3.6 billion in fiscal year 2012 and a total of $46.2 billion during the next decade.

But the proposal to eliminate oil tax breaks faces major opposition in Congress. Though Democrats have thrown their support behind the proposal, Republicans have said any attempt to revoke industry tax breaks could harm the economy and result in job losses. The president has long called for cutting the tax breaks, but Congress has not been able to muster the necessary support to pass such a proposal.

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http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/143753-obamas-budget-to-call-for-slashing-oil-tax-breaks-boosting-clean-energy

[Skittles]

1. stop the tax breaks for offshore whores too, while you're doing the right thing

yes INDEED

[impik]

2. This ugly congress will never approve it, and guess who "progressives" are going to blame?

[FrenchieCat]

9. It's only Obama's fault if it is a nefarious terrible thing being supposedly proposed.....

anything good that is proposed couldn't have had anything to do with him....
or be something that we could maybe finally fucking stand up and fight for
via citizen action.....instead of whining all of the time.

Predictable.

Guess that's how they came up with "what does a brother have to do to get any credit round here?"

It appears that the answer is he can do nothing.....

[Vinnie From Indy]

3. I simply have been conditioned to doubt any call to take on big industry by govt.

So, Obama plans to "go after" Big Oil huh?

Maybe we will see another "stunning" victory by the Obama Admin by negotiating with the GOP to take away the 3.5 Billion in tax breaks while removing every single restraint on monopolistic pricing, monitoring and environmental regulation. Yeah, Big Oil will take that deal just like Big Insurance took the news of the HRC passage by breaking out the champagne and caviar.

[FrenchieCat]

6. So in essense, you are skeptical when something positive is being proposed......

as your starting point,
but yet don't have a problem believing wholesale
when something negative is "rumored" to "May" get proposed "perhaps"?
That would make you consistent with my image of so many Duers.

[Vinnie From Indy]

10. I guess past experience has an effect on my initial opinion on these matters

I will admit that I have no idea what the final deal will look like. As for your "image" of me being like so many Du'ers, I hope you mean others that deeply care about progressive issues and refuse to be lied to or cowed into silence.

Cheers!

[jefferson_dem]

8. So this "good news" is actually "bad news"?

Uh huh... Right. :eyes:

[FrenchieCat]

4. Let's see if he gets as much positive support on this

as he's getting lashback for the rumored stuff that
he hasn't proposed yet.

Let's see what's considered "balanced" in terms of reactions
here at DU.

I'll bet this topic won't be hailed by the usual suspect
who only do "Knee-deep in Obama's ass" type of commentating.

[democracy1st]

5. All smoking mirrors guaranteed not to pass just bs!

[FrenchieCat]

7. So this is a negative from your standpoint, right?

Not real.
Just made up.
Just a bunch of nothings, hey?

I wish folks were so skeptical when it was rumored that
Obama was going to cut Social Security. Then, even as a rumor,
folks were signing up to tar and feather him based on that bunch
of nothing that was pushed by the usual suspects.

Why are we only cynical with positive proposals....
and believing with all of our faith of any negative possible proposals,
no matter how sketchy sources and rumors are?

What makes us so suspicious....but only of the positive,
while we buy wholesale into the rumored negative...and even
when it doesn't happen, we don't step back, not even for a millisecond,
instead we continue in believing in the next rumored negative proposal
even harder than the last one.

[RandomKoolzip]

12. Uh...people are cynical with positive proposals because

experience has taught them that positive proposals are a) bullshit, b) not bullshit, but doomed to failure, or c) in the end, compromised beyond recognition. Whereas we believe the negative press because more often than not, it turns out to be true. Too many progressives put too many of their hopes for change into this administration to only be spurned, scorned, and disappointed; this shouldn't be surprising.

In other words, as Frank Zappa once said, "I haven't become more cynical, I've just got more evidence to back up my cynicism."

[ProSense]

11. Why the specifics are important:

Krugman on President Obama's first budget (2010):

Elections have consequences. President Obama’s new budget represents a huge break, not just with the policies of the past eight years, but with policy trends over the past 30 years. If he can get anything like the plan he announced on Thursday through Congress, he will set America on a fundamentally new course.

<...>

Spotlight on Poverty: The President’s 2011 Budget Priorities: Cut Poverty and Promote Opportunity

There are winners and losers in every budget, and President Obama’s proposed federal 2011 budget, released this month, is no exception. What’s most remarkable, however, about the President’s proposal is that low-income kids and families stand out as a clear priority. Wherever you look in his budget document, you see that he has worked hard to put the poor and disadvantaged near the top of his agenda. We’ve been following federal budgets for some 40 years, and this is one of the strongest attempts we’ve seen from any president, of either party, to propose spending priorities that would do much to reduce poverty and promote opportunity.

Even more remarkable, he proposes to do this within a very austere spending plan. President Obama has proposed a freeze on domestic non-security discretionary programs. However, within that freeze, he has protected and improved many critical low-income programs. The priorities in the President’s budget work to address both his short-term goal of strengthening the economy and creating jobs, while helping those hardest hit by the downturn, as well as his longer-term goal of bringing the deficit down and restoring fiscal responsibility.

<...>

[Frustratedlady]

13. Heads are going to explode on the oil tax break issue. Whoa!

Maybe Obama is trying to get their attention, since the other side of the aisle doesn't pay attention to anything he says.

He may be throwing that out as a negotiating tool. OK, you don't want to lose the oil industry tax breaks...let's talk! kind of deal.

If not, I'll say one thing for Obama...he's got nerve. Maybe it would be nice if the "people" stood behind him on this, rather than criticize? Just sayin'.

[FrenchieCat]

14. You see how few bothered to even comment on this thread....doncha?