House panel endorses Obama's ambitious budget plan

[Pirate Smile]

Source: Associated Press

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's allies rallied around his ambitious budget blueprint as he visited the Capitol on Wednesday, and only hours later a House panel endorsed it, pointing the way for major legislation this year on health care, energy and education.

Even so, both the House measure approved by the House Budget Committee on a party-line vote shortly before midnight and a companion Senate plan lack specifics for any of the administration's signature proposals. And Democrats, particularly in the Senate, decided to cut spending and reduce exploding deficits below levels envisioned in the plan Obama presented less than a month ago.

The Senate Budget Committee was expected to approved its version of the measure Thursday, preparing it for a vote by the full Senate next week.
Administration officials and congressional leaders said any differences were modest.

"This budget will protect President Obama's priorities — education, energy, health care, middle class tax relief and cut the deficit in half," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said after Obama met privately in the Capitol with rank-and-file Democrats.
Earlier, White House Budget Director Peter Orszag told reporters the congressional budgets "may not be identical twins to what the president submitted, but they are certainly brothers that look an awful lot alike."



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090326/ap_on_go_co/congress_budget;_ylt=AgC4MAI9Al7W7Xq24aK2SUmyFz4D

[griz2008]

1. Hell Yeah

about friggin time.