Winners and losers in Obama's budget

[cali]

By MEREDITH SHINER | 2/14/11 4:07 PM EST

President Barack Obama’s budget is full of proposals that likely will never see the light of day — but that doesn’t mean there aren’t political winners and losers buried in the 208-page economic policy wish list.

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Here’s a look at the winners and losers on budget day in Washington.

The Winners:

Arne Duncan

The Obama basketball buddy-turned-popular-administration official was one of Monday’s primetime winners. The education secretary — one of the few original Chicago advisers left in the White House inner sanctum —was at the Obama’s side when he made his first public comments on the budget at a Baltimore school. Duncan’s appearance at the morning press conference was revealing about White House strategy moving forward. Looking to score bipartisan victories in a new divided Congress, the president is betting big on education — don’t forget Speaker John Boehner was a key negotiator on No Child Left Behind — allotting $77.4 billion dollars to the department, including $1.4 billion for “new competitions” in the mold of last year’s “Race to the Top” program. “Race to the Top” has been viewed as a triumph for the administration and Duncan himself, who spearheaded the initiative. More money to the Department of Education, if Congress follows through with it, could mean an even higher profile for Duncan.

<snip>

Losers

The liberal base

House Democrats carried Obama’s agenda across the finish line for two years, and poof, just like that they’re getting tossed under the bus in the president’s first budget under a divided Washington.

Whether it’s through Pell Grant cuts, reductions on Medicaid or slashes to community organizations, the programs that mean the most to the most loyal Obama supporters are coming under the knife.

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Poor people in cold climates

In one of the more controversial moves in the budget, Obama slashed funding to the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), cutting $2.5 billion — or 50 percent — of the initiative’s budget from the books. LIHEAP is a popular program that assists poor people and seniors in paying their heating and cooling bills and as word spread that the president was considering making significant dents into LIHEAP’s coffers, 31 senators — including John Kerry (D-Mass.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Republcians Susan Collins and Olypmia Snowe and Scott Brown (R-Mass.) — sent OMB director Jack Lew a letter Friday challenging the cuts. On the House side, Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) said Obama’s budget means families will be “forced once again to decide between heating and eating.”


Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0211/49492.html#ixzz1DyF5H7U6

[OhioChick]

1. Winners: Wealthy....Losers: Poor & Middle Class n/t

[rhett o rick]

2. k&R

[a kennedy]

3. This just makes me so sad......

:cry: :cry: :cry:

[bvar22]

4. K&R

When the Working Class & The Poor realize we have more in common with each other
than we have in common with the RICH and their puppets in the leadership of BOTH political parties,
we can demand "change".
WE outnumber THEM.

Until then,
BOHICA because they're better than Palin!
:woohoo:

[ProSense]

5. Information on the

budget here and here.

[jaxx]

6. This is the kind of crap you expect from rightwing Politico.

They stir the pot, and accuracy is not a given. It looks to me like it's meant to anger the base, who know better.