Jeff Sessions and Paul Ryan
USA Today
2/15/2011
At a time when strong leadership is needed in the White House, President Obama has disappointed us with a budget that punts responsibility for America’s greatest fiscal challenges. Lasting solutions will require a willing partner in the White House — and we don’t appear to have one right now.
It is disappointing that the president would put forward another budget that spends too much, taxes too much and borrows too much. It is a budget that destroys jobs today and would leave future generations a diminished country.
Under his plan, the federal government would spend $46 trillion over the next 10 years, doubling the national debt by the end of his term and tripling it by the end of the decade. The president’s much-hyped “spending freeze” for a small fraction of the budget simply locks in the elevated spending levels of the last two years. By contrast, congressional Republicans are working to chart a new course — one that restores confidence to the private sector by getting government spending under control.
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke recently testified before the House Budget Committee that one of the best things Congress can do to get businesses to start hiring and the economy to start growing again is to demonstrate that we have a serious plan that will fix our government’s deep fiscal problems.
Last year, the president punted these problems to a commission instead of putting forward his own ideas for balancing the budget. This commission issued its report in December, and while we didn’t agree with all of its recommendations, we took the seriousness of its proposal as a hopeful sign, and stood ready to build on its good ideas. To us, the commission’s work represented a step forward.
The article continues at USA Today.
