Lawmakers tear into $3.6 trillion budget plan
WASHINGTON -- Some of President Obama's top economic officials got an earful from members of Congress on Tuesday about what troubles them in the president's budget plan:
Spending. Taxes. Deficits. Debt. And the economic forecasts upon which the budget is based.
Republicans did most of the quarreling with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and White House budget director Peter Orszag in separate hearings on the $3.6 trillion proposal, which contains Obama's major health care, energy and education initiatives.
It was left to a moderate Democrat, Rep. Allen Boyd of Florida, to state an even broader concern: that on the heels of $787 billion in economic stimulus and $700 billion in financial rescue funds already approved, Obama might be trying to do too much.
"You need to be careful about taking on too many issues," Boyd warned Orszag at a House Budget Committee hearing, because it "might sink the whole ship."
Orszag and Geithner, who appeared before the House Ways and Means Committee, said much the same thing: They inherited a recession, banking and housing crises and a $1.2 trillion deficit. "What's the alternative," Orszag said, "rather than trying to address these key problems?"
Administration officials will continue to fan out across Capitol Hill this month in an effort to sell key elements of the Obama spending plan as Congress writes its own budget resolution. Details of the administration's plan won't be available until April.
Among the complaints Orszag and Geithner heard Tuesday:
•The budget spends too much. "The numbers in this budget are staggeringly high," said Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis. House Budget Committee Chairman John Spratt, D-S.C., noted $634 billion set aside to overhaul the health care system is just a down payment on a final price tag likely to top $1 trillion.
Orszag acknowledged the budget, if adopted, would represent 27% of the nation's economy, the highest level since World War II. Even so, he said, "this budget is not a big-spending budget."
