GOP Rep.: Obama Spending Freeze ‘Doesn’t Go Far Enough’

ABC News’ Rick Klein reports: Though President Obama’s proposal for a freeze in non-security-related discretionary spending was offered as an enticement to get Republicans in Congress behind a key budget initiative, it’s being met with a cool reception on Capitol Hill. On ABC’s “Top Line” today, Rep. Bob Latta, R-Ohio, a member of the House Budget Committee, said he doesn’t see much in the way of Republican support for the proposal because “actually it doesn’t go far enough.” “When you look at what they’re doing, they’re freezing at the highest levels of spending ever in federal government budgets,” Latta told us. “And when you look at what was added last year, you know, from the stimulus and the omnibus bills that passed out of here — when you’re looking at, you know, 12 1/2 percent increase in some of these departments — that’s not where you start at. We need to go back a couple years and freeze there, not at these absolutely high levels that we’re at today.” Republicans are particularly skeptical about the president’s plan to let the Bush tax cuts expire: “I don’t think that phasing out these tax cuts is the right thing,” Latta said. “I think what we start with is, you know, we have we don’t have a revenue problem in this town we have a spending problem. And that’s what we need to do.” Watch the discussion with Rep. Bob Latta HERE. We also chatted with Ana Marie Cox about the push to make the president’s “question time” with lawmakers a regular feature of political discourse, and the machinations around the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. Watch that segment of “Top Line” HERE.