Republicans come out firing against Obama deficit plan

UPDATED 12:33 p.m. ET

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.)

Even before President Obama unveiled his $3 trillion proposal to cut the deficit with $1.5 trillion in tax hikes for the rich, Republicans on Capitol Hill were declaring it dead, with a key lawmaker labelling it "class warfare."

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, who earlier this year had unveiled his own budget blueprint which famously proposed turning Medicare into a voucher system, said Mr. Obama is too focused on his own re-election.

"He's in a political class warfare mode and campaign mode. And that's not good for our economy," Ryan said on Fox News Sunday.

In an effort to draw a line in the sand with Republicans, Mr. Obama proposed a long-term deficit reduction plan that is halfway composed of new tax revenues for the highest earning Americans.

The millionaire's tax is modeled on a proposal from billionaire investor Warren Buffett, who has long suggested the super-rich should pay higher tax rates. The plan also includes almost $250 billion in reductions in Medicare spending, $330 billion in cuts in other mandatory benefit programs, and savings of $1 trillion from the withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell lambasted Buffett's suggestion for higher taxes.

"If he's feeling guilty about it I think he should send in a check ... But we don't want to stagnate this economy by raising taxes," McConnell said Sunday on NBC's Meet the Press.

The plan sets up another showdown with House Speaker John Boehner, who last week gave a high-profile speech in which he ruled out raising taxes on anybody--including millionaires.

"It's a very simple equation" Boehner said in his speech to the Economic Club of Washington. "Tax increases destroy jobs. And the Joint Committee is a jobs committee. Its mission is to reduce the deficit that is threatening job creation in our country."

On Monday, Boehner echoed the class warfare theme.

"Pitting one group of Americans against another is not leadership,' Boehner said in a written statement.

"This administration's insistence on raising taxes on job creators and its reluctance to take the steps necessary to strengthen our entitlement programs are the reasons the president and I were not able to reach an agreement previously, and it is evident today that these barriers remain," he added.

Mr. Obama said insisting on higher taxes for some Americans is not class warfare, it's math.

"The money has to come from some place," Mr. Obama said in the White House Rose Garden, "if we're not willing to ask those who've done extraordinarily well to help America close the deficit... the math says everybody else has to do a whole lot more, we've got to put the entire burden on the middle class and the poor."

[SparkysMom]

It is so ridiculous to hear Republicans decry, "Class warfare!" They have been the perpetrators of this situation, it is only that now finally... lots of folks are recognizing their propaganda and manipulation for what it is. We need to get tough and stick together like they have been doing for the last decade.

[gep1955]

I see a story about reporters going to Rick Perry's home town. Just like Palin. How come nobody went to Chicago to dig up dirt on Obama?

[gep1955]

The only, only way somebody makes into the wealthy class is by a lot of hard work and by risking a lot of your own money hoping to make it back. This notion that liberals spew that the rich just wake up one day with money is infantile and misleading.

The earthquake a couple weeks ago in Virginia was the Founding Fathers turning over in their graves.

[dj_chi]

You aren't aware of people who use their friends to get insider deals and spend money to buy political influence and legislative favoratism? This is Chicago, there are so many trucking companies, law firms, janitorial companies and more who used paid contacts in the Daley administration to get contracts for little work or just to lock out competitive bids that the feds can employee a sizable staff for just here. Have you not read a newspaper in the past decade?

[fiberglass3]

"Class Warfare" is what the Republican't's have been doing to the middle class for far to long.

[steeepe]

Jarheadvet: What's with the BS about Marxism and socialism? Did you ever learn to think? I'm so tired of responding to these total inanities. Go learn something about political and economic systems before you start parroting BS all the time. It's really tiresome!

[slatep]

John Boehner and the rest of the Resmuglicans who blindly follow him should all be charged with treason or terrorism.

Their refusal to even read the program before declaring it "dead" is reminiscent of the Obama health carebill.

Nobody in Washington read all of that either.

One way to cut down on the deficit is to start paying Congressmen and Senators by the HOUR.

Take away all the perks amd make them live under the same rules as the rest of us.

Since they only work 26 weeks of the year, they should be paid only for the hours they actually work.

That the Republican party is out to destroy the middle class is a secret to no one.

In their zeal to destroy Obama, they have compltely lost sight of what they were elected to do.

What's even more obvious is they have forgotten their constituents
exist and are showing how arrogant and ignorant they are by projecting the image that they and they alone run the US and screw everybody else.

I would really like to know who gave them the authority to give themselves raises, makes them believe they are above the law, set up "special" healthcare and pension programs for themselves, etc.

We are taught all men are created equal.

We are taught there should be equal justice under the law.

Just who declared, where and exactly what time did these politicans become special.

If they are not prepared to live their lives being paid for work they have done and live their lives the way the rest of us are forced to; they need to go somewhere and start their own country.

Politicians in Washington are in over their heads, their jobs are at stake (never in a million years did they actually believe their consituents would have the audacity to challenge them or make them accountable for their mistakes).

Now, these cowards, instead of standing up and facing the music, they have chosen 12 poor slobs to become the "super committee" and have every last mistake they have ever made dumped on them.

It's time they learned that they cannot continue to crawl out of septic tanks and come out smelling like roses.

Do we really want people like these; making decisions that affect almost every part of our everyday lives and "giving" away our hard earned tax dollars to countries that hate us to help them build their infrastructures while our own are crumbling; governing this country.??!!

[MurdochSucks]

What is with Republican's obsession with warfare? Are they missing a gene for progress or something? Everything is a war with them, and usually a failure. War on drugs, war on terror, cultural war, the Iraq war, class warfare, it just goes on and on. They are completely obsessed with it.

[JarHeadVet64]

Obama is for war in Lybia, Iraq, Afganistan, Pakistan and a secret one in Yemen. So class warfare comes natually to him.
Marxist socialist use class warfare all the time to seize power while the indoctinated lemmings cheer them on.
Liberals are sheeple who try to appease their enemies just before they lose their freedom.

[MurdochSucks]

I forgot the war on Christmas, nice. They seem to see war everywhere. They are paranoid.

JarHead, Obama is scaling down the two Bush wars, and is supporting Libyan revolt against a vile dictator, the US is not actively fighting. I disagree with our involvement but it is not a US war.

Obama is certainly not a Marxist, and nowhere near a socialist. He is a centrist, corporatist, which I also disagree with.

Republicans wanted to give away all their freedom through the Patriot Act. Liberals try reasonable compromise where possible, Conservatives just draw lines in the sand at every turn and make everything a crusade, as if they are being attacked. Like I said, they are paranoid, almost to the point of schizophrenia.

[starman5409]

America has been on the right track, its Congress that's on the wrong track. Speaker of the House needs to be a non-partisan person who can fairly referee between the two houses.

The current speaker should be arrested for treason and hung on the White House lawn. What he has done and is still doing is unconstitutional, absolutist and obstructionist. That is why we got rid of the British in the first place over 200 years ago.
You don't get it!! How is the president supposed to get anything done when Congress blocks him at every step. It's Congress that needs replaced, not the President.

Congress does not live in the real world. They should all be paid minimum wage and living in public housing for their entire term; no fancy limo's and restaurants, no 5 week vacations, just work, like the rest of the country. You live in the trenches with the remaining 100+ million Americans on low and fixed incomes. Only then will you be able to understand what this country needs. These people forget that they work for us, not the other way around.

And taxes should be fair and equal for all, if you earn 10 billion, you pay 1 billion, if you earn 100,000 you pay 10,000. The party system should be abolished, as it serves no useful purpose other than promoting bigotry and infighting.
e wrong track.

[MurdochSucks]

Here is a piece about how the GOP has changed the way government works. It is a little long, but an interesting read. They are essentially using weaknesses built into Congress to stonewall progress.

http://www.truth-out.org/goodbye-all-reflections-gop-operative-who-left-cult/1314907779

[slatep]

I'amazed by you.!!

FINALLY.!!Somebody with a clear mind, common sense and no political ambitions tells it like it SHOULD be.

CONGRATULATIONS.!!

[MurdochSucks]

So the wealthy class has done very well in the last decade while the middle and poor classes have been flat and lost jobs. Why shouldn't they pay more taxes when they are in a time of great affluence and the rest of the nation is hurting? That's not class warfare, it is called paying your bills. We decide we want certain services from our government, and we have to pay for those services. The selfishness of our culture is really sad and astounding.

[24zen]

Indeed, it is class warfare! The middle class needs to take to the streets and take their country back. Most of the affluent aren't job creators they are simply opportunists looking to make an extra buck off the backs of the poor and middle class. Many of these people are the same folks who would have all of us thumping bibles but yet cast out the sick, poor and needy. If they really were righteous and such followers of Jesus would they be rich anywa? What would Jesus do? Tell me right winger, tea bagger type. What would Jesus do??

[MurdochSucks]

I think he is just a fairy tale, anyway (you really think a man was born to a married virgin?), but certainly the portrayal of him in the bible is nothing like the caricature of his current tea farting followers. They cheered for Executioner Perry when reminded that he had executed 234 people in his 11 years as Texas governor. That's one person murdered every 17.2 days, or 412 hours.