Lawmakers Trade Blame as Deficit Talks Crumble

I do not believe that this committee is going to make the deadline. It is amazing to me how they will at the expense of the American people, fail to uphold their end of the deal. They knew this day was coming, and they have been doing everything else and talking around the hard issues for months. Now that it is time to make some hard decisions, they are choosing to sell the American people out. In my opinion, the 'halls of congress' should be the next place to be occupied.

With the hours ticking away toward a self-imposed deadline, Congressional leaders conceded Sunday that talks on a sweeping deficit agreement were near failure and braced for recriminations over their inability to reach a deal.

The stalemate was the latest sign of partisan deadlock in Washington, which members of both parties do not expect to lift until the 2012 election has clarified which party has the upper hand.

Barring an unexpected turnaround before Monday’s deadline, the failure of the special Congressional deficit committee will be the third high-profile effort to fall short of a deal in the last 12 months, including a bipartisan deficit commission and talks last summer between President Obama and Speaker John A. Boehner.

By law, the special Congressional committee’s inability to reach an agreement will trigger $1.2 trillion in automatic spending cuts over 10 years to the military and domestic programs, to start in 2013.

As time wound down to a Monday night deadline for an agreement, Capitol Hill lacked the frenzied negotiation typical of a Congressional race to beat the clock. Instead, many members — well aware that Congressional approval ratings are near historic lows in polls — seemed resigned to the fact that Democrats and Republicans remained far apart on major budget issues, especially tax increases on the affluent, which Democrats insist must be part of any deficit solution and which Republicans oppose.


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