President Obama

GOP Won’t Play Ball on Obamacare Advisory Panels

Posted on 05/9/2013 by | General News | Comments

Bulletin Today | Personal Health | PoliticsBy Jim Abrams, The Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — House and Senate Republican leaders told President Barack Obama Thursday that they will refuse to nominate candidates to serve on an advisory board that is to play a role in holding down Medicare costs under the new health care act. House Speaker John Boehner, who joined Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell in boycotting the Independent Payment Advisory Board, also said that the House next week will vote again to repeal the …

Budget Gridlock Feeds Pessimism at Annual Fiscal ‘Summit’

Posted on 05/8/2013 by | General News | Comments

Bulletin Today | PoliticsBy Andrew Taylor, The Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — On this, some of Washington’s highest-ranking budget players can agree: A “grand bargain” this year to close the nation’s chronic budget deficits seems like a long shot. That was the consensus at an annual Washington “fiscal summit” thrown by billionaire deficit hawk Pete Peterson, who’s staked $1 billion of his fortune on a foundation aimed at raising public awareness of the dangers of the government’s growing debt. But barely 100 days into …

Is Congress Trying to Sneak Out of Obamacare? Don’t Bet on It

Posted on 04/29/2013 by | Washington Watch | Comments

Bulletin Today | PoliticsFew things rile some people as much as the new health care law and the benefits that Capitol Hill lawmakers give themselves. So it’s not at all surprising that the idea of Congress exempting itself from Obamacare would make political commentators’ tongues wag and an angry public Tweet like mad—real mad. But is it much ado about nothing? John Breshnahan and Jake Sherman of Politico touched off the venting with their report that lawmakers are worried that Obamacare could raise …

Congress Nibbles at Obama’s Budget

Posted on 04/18/2013 by | Washington Watch | Comments

Bulletin Today | PoliticsNow it’s Congress’ turn. Last week President Obama made his budget proposal, and lawmakers on Capitol Hill already have begun trying to bend it to their will. On April 18, in fact, the House Ways and Means Committee will take up one of the most controversial pages in the budget book: the proposal to change the way that benefits under Social Security and other federal programs are adjusted for inflation. The “chained consumer price index,” or chained CPI, would mean …

The 3 Budget Plans: How Do They Stack Up?

Posted on 04/18/2013 by | News | Comments

Bulletin Today | PoliticsNow that President Obama has sent his 2014 budget proposal to Congress, three blueprints for the nation’s fiscal future are on the table. The other two are sharply divergent plans drafted by the lawmakers who chair the congressional budget committees: Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.). The Republican-controlled House passed the Ryan budget on March 21; the Democratic-controlled Senate passed the Murray budget two days later. We surveyed news accounts and nonpartisan analyses to pull together the …

Obama’s Budget Aims to Expand the Estate Tax

Posted on 04/16/2013 by | Washington Watch | Comments

Bulletin Today | PoliticsJust a few months ago, President Obama and Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill negotiated their way off the fiscal cliff and agreed to make the estate tax a mere shadow of its former self — so much so, according to estimates from the Tax Policy Center, that only 3,800 estates will owe any federal estate tax in 2013. President Obama’s new budget proposal, however, aims to turn things back around. It would raise the estate tax rate to 45 percent …

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