(Reuters/Larry Downing)
Boehner
isn't going to give an inch, apparently. Though he'll be "nice" about it.
"Our disagreements are not personal and never have been," House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) just said of the ongoing discussions he's been having with Democratic President Obama about deficit reduction.
And Boehner said he appreciates the kind words Obama had to say earlier today about the speaker's efforts to forge a "grand bargain" that leads to significant deficit reduction and action on controlling costs for Social Security, Medicare and other so-called entitlement programs.
But Republicans, Boehner told reporters on Capitol Hill, "do not agree [with Obama] that the government needs more revenues through higher taxes on job creators." The House will not pass such legislation, he added.
He also said: "The president continues to insist on raising taxes, and [Democrats] are just not serious enough about fundamental entitlement reform to solve the problem."
It's not about the deficit. It's about taxes. Steve Benen has a good takedown on the delusionary economics spouted by Boehner. It's probably that Boehner is just spouting so much gibberish "as a way to get back in his caucus' good graces." Or he could believe his gibberish. But there was this part that Benen highlighted that needs some deeper consideration:
Second, blaming “spending and entitlement spending” as the biggest obstacles to job growth is incoherent. It’s not only dumb because spending pumps money into the economy and creates jobs, but also because the notion that programs like Social Security and Medicare are interfering with the job market is mystifying.
That would be a fact that President Obama would do well to heed when talking about benefits cuts, and let's be clear, when he was talking about Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, he was talking about cuts and nothing else this morning.