Lawmakers urge Obama to accept mandatory restraints on spending

[The Northerner]

Lawmakers in both parties urged President Obama to offer a detailed plan for curbing the national debt in the speech he is to deliver on Wednesday, warning that they will not authorize fresh borrowing unless he agrees to mandatory restraints on future spending.

With the debt nudging closer to the legal limit — set at $14.3 trillion — anxiety is running high on Capitol Hill. Lawmakers are reluctant to approve legislation that would permit the debt to rise or to face the potentially devastating economic consequences if the government were to stop borrowing and default on its obligations.

Just to see the nation through next year, lawmakers would have to raise the limit by nearly $2.2 trillion under the spending plan Obama submitted to Congress in February, according to congressional budget analysts. Even the austere blueprint House Republicans plan to approve this week would require about $1.9 trillion in fresh debt by October 2012 — a month before the next presidential election.

Republicans and Democrats alike said on Tuesday that failing to raise the debt limit would invite catastrophe. But many said they could not in good conscience authorize more borrowing unless Obama agreed to cap federal spending, adopt triggers to force rewrites of the tax code and entitlement programs, or accept some other binding mechanism for bringing the debt under control.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/lawmakers-urge-obama-to-accept-mandatory-restraints-on-spending/2011/04/12/AF5IC7SD_story.html

[msongs]

1. lol everybody knows obama won't fight back that much nt

[damntexdem]

2. Congressional Dems are already stabbing us in the back.

Before Obama even has any chance to do it again.