Partisan divide on debt talks growing deeper; Obama says he won’t accept stopgap plan 11JUL11

THE repiglicans and tea-baggers are determined to destroy this country. They are willing to sacrifice the national economy to protect the rich and corporate America's welfare system. Their arrogance and greed is disgusting. PRESIDENT OBAMA AND THE DEMOCRATS MUST STAND FIRM AND NOT GIVE IN TO THE REPIGLICANS AND TEA-BAGGERS. WE WILL NOT TOLERATE GIVING INTO THEIR IMMORAL DEMANDS! From the Washington Post...

By Lori Montgomery

Talks between President Obama and congressional Republicans grew increasingly contentious on Monday, as GOP leaders flatly rejected his call to raise taxes on the wealthy as part of a bipartisan agreement to restrain the nation’s mounting debt.
Dueling news conferences by Obama and House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) served as a testy prelude to an afternoon bargaining session that only emphasized the partisan divide, according to people on both sides with knowledge of the closed-door discussions.
During the meeting, Obama challenged Boehner to buck the anti-tax hard-liners in his party who, the president suggested, are blocking the path to a landmark compromise to reduce borrowing by as much as $4 trillion over the next decade. Boehner and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) responded by urging Democrats to settle for a more modest reductions-only deal that would save $2.4 trillion but would not touch tax breaks for the nation’s richest households.
In addition to major cuts to domestic agencies, the House GOP proposal calls for slicing about $250 billion from Medicare over the next decade by asking well-off seniors to pay more for health coverage, placing new restrictions on Medigap policies and putting in place new co-payments and cost-sharing provisions for home health care, among other changes. Those reductions would come on top of about $500 billion in Medicare savings previously enacted as part of Obama’s overhaul of the health-care system — cuts Republicans blasted during last fall’s midterm campaign. 
Obama rejected the GOP plan, said a Democratic official familiar with the discussions, arguing that he could not ask “moderate-income seniors to bear $500 or more of additional costs when you couldn’t ask the most well-off American to give an extra $5 to getting the deficit down.”
At a White House news conference hours earlier, a clearly exasperated Obama said he has “bent over backward” to meet Republican demands for sharp cuts in government spending, citing his offer to trim Social Security and Medicare benefits — an offer that has drawn howls from liberal Democrats. That offer included raising the Medicare eligibility age, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the talks.
Unless Republicans are willing to make the same ideological concession on taxes, he said, “I do not see a path to a deal.”
“We keep on talking about this stuff and we have these high-minded pronouncements about how we’ve got to get control of the deficit and how we owe it to our children and our grandchildren. Well, let’s step up. Let’s do it,” Obama said. “I’m prepared to take significant heat from my party to get something done. And I expect the other side should be willing to do the same thing.”
Republicans fired back that they already are taking plenty of heat for considering an increase in the legal limit on the debt, which stands at a record $14.3 trillion. In a sign of deepening tensions, Boehner suggested that the only concession Obama should expect from Republicans is a vote to allow the Treasury to continue borrowing.
“Most Americans would say that a ‘balanced’ approach is a simple one: The administration gets its debt-limit increase and the American people get their spending cuts and their reforms,” Boehner told reporters at a news conference before heading to the White House. “Adding tax increases to the equation doesn’t balance anything.”
Obama and Boehner took pains to express their admiration for each other, but the prickly rhetoric suggested that hope has faded for a far-ranging $4 trillion agreement. After a friendly game of golf and three weeks of secret talks, the two had hoped to forge a historic deal to tackle the biggest drivers of the debt, including cuts to health-care and retirement programs, military spending and an inefficient tax code.
Boehner blew up those talks last weekend, citing irreconcilable differences with the White House over taxes and the magnitude of structural changes to entitlement programs. “I want to get there,” he said Monday. “But it takes two to tango, and they’re not there yet.”
That sent negotiators back to the drawing board with just three weeks until Aug. 2, when the government risks defaulting on its obligations without additional borrowing authority. Lawmakers in both parties have refused to raise the debt limit without a plan to restrain the debt in the future.
Obama, Vice President Biden and the top two leaders of each party in the House and the Senate are racing to draft such a package by July 22, to leave enough time for what is likely to be a difficult sales pitch to their respective rank and file. Negotiators agreed to meet again Tuesday afternoon, and Obama said they will meet daily — including through the weekend, if necessary — to seal a deal.
Monday’s meeting focused on the only apparent alternative to what many have taken to calling the “grand bargain”: A $2.4 trillion package that was under discussion in earlier talks led by Biden.
Cantor, a party to the Biden talks, said the group was tantalizingly close to its target, which would be big enough to permit House Republicans to agree to an increase in the debt limit sufficient to pay the government’s bills until well after the 2012 election.
But Democrats, and some Senate Republicans, said the consensus was closer to $1.5 trillion — and that assumed an agreement to raise taxes on wealthy households that the GOP was unwilling to make.
“When Republicans say, ‘Let’s just go back to the Biden talks,’ it’s important to remember, they walked out of the Biden talks,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.).
Some Republicans have raised the prospect of a short-term deal. But Obama emphatically rejected that option Monday, saying he would not sign “a 30-day or a 60-day or a 90-day extension.”
A deal is only “going to get harder” as the election approaches, Obama said. “So we might as well do it now. Pull off the Band-Aid. Eat our peas.
“If not now, when?”

Exclusive NRA Deal for Campaign Law? 15JUN10 & Feinstein Slams House Democrats For NRA Deal 16JUN10

THE NEO-NAZI, FASCIST, COWARDLY PIGS OF THE NRA ARE AT IT AGAIN....NOW DEMANDING THEY BE EXEMPTED FROM THE PROPOSED DISCLOSURE RULES SO THE AMERICAN PUBLIC CAN'T FIND OUT WHAT POLITICIANS THEY ARE BUYING AND WHAT RIGHT-WING CAUSES THEY ARE FUNDING HYPOCRITES! I REALLY WISH THESE PEOPLE WOULD EXPERIENCE THE CONSEQUENCES OF THEIR POLITICS AND POLICIES UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL. SOMEDAY IT WILL HAPPEN TO THEM AND THEY WILL EXPERIENCE THE PAIN AND AGONY AND SORROW THEY HAVE FORCED ON SO MANY OTHERS. AND SOMEDAY THE SPINELESS POLITICIANS WILL EXPERIENCE THE CONSEQUENCES OF KOW-TOWING TO THE NRA TOO.

The introduction of new campaign finance legislation in the House has met with mixed reviews owing primarily to the disclosure exemption added for the National Rifle Association. But despite the criticism expressed by a host of good government groups -- some of which have begrudgingly said they would support the legislation -- the effort didn't seem to be in much political peril.
Until now, perhaps. On Wednesday morning, Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Cali.) became the first Democratic lawmaker to publicly come out against the NRA deal, in a statement provided to the Huffington Post.

I strongly oppose any special exemption for the National Rifle Association in the DISCLOSE Act. The purpose of this bill is to make sure that elected representatives are not beholden to special interests, yet here is special interest # 1 receiving a deal to exempt it from an otherwise very good bill.
This is bad policy. The law should apply to the NRA, just like any other group. If the NRA, or any similar group, is going to spend millions on political ads, the American public has a right to know who is funding them.
The bill is the DISCLOSE Act, not the 'Everyone Except the NRA DISCLOSE Act.'
The NRA claims they need an exemption to protect their First Amendment rights, but that argument simply doesn't hold up. The Supreme Court has stated clearly that although all are free to speak and advocate their positions, when a group runs ads for and against candidates, disclosure requirements are appropriate.

Democrats can ill-afford Senate defections on this legislation. Already, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has come out against the DISCLOSE Act, criticizing its authors for cutting a deal with the gun lobby and expressing traditionally-conservative complaints about the broader "restrictions" on free speech. It stands to reason that a large chunk of the GOP caucus will echo his complaints.
Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is tasked with moving parallel legislation through the chamber. And aides say he too understands that an NRA exemption is likely needed to keep that group from lobbying against the measure. But if Feinstein (a longtime gun-control advocate) is to defect -- and if she is to be joined by a handful of other Democrats -- the party could very well find itself short on votes.

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There is likely some time to find agreement. A Senate aide tells the Huffington Post that the chamber would like to move the bill forward between now and the upcoming recess two weeks away. But they will wait for the House to pass its bill first. And if that doesn't occur by the end of the week, the calendar for Senate consideration is unclear.

Exclusive NRA Deal for Campaign Law?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-helmke/exclusive-nra-deal-for-ca_b_613285.html?ir=Daily%20Brief

In a demonstration of blatant political cynicism, the NRA now has no problems with campaign finance donor disclosure laws -- as long as it gets exempted.
To the NRA bosses, it's not just "the guys with the guns make the rules," but the guys with the undisclosed money sources make the rules -- particularly when everybody else's donors have to be disclosed. It's no longer just guns that they say will have to be pried from their "cold dead hands." It's their donor lists, too.
In a shameful and outrageous move, the NRA has pressured the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives to exempt it -- and apparently only it -- from proposed legislation that would require corporations, unions, and advocacy and lobbying groups to reveal donations used to support political campaigns.
Under H.R. 5175, every other group or corporation would have to report the names of people who donate at least $600 to expenditures directed at or available for election activities. Every. Other. Group -- such as the Sierra Club, the AFL-CIO, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Gun Owners of America, the National Right-to-Life Committee, and the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. Every group -- except the NRA.
The original bill, authored by Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, is a response to the 5-4 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this year that basically allows corporations to spend as much money on political activities as they want -- any time they want.
Van Hollen's proposal sought to bring transparency to the process by requiring that corporations, and other groups doing political advocacy, report major sources of funds for expenditures late in the campaigns of federal candidates for office. But in an effort to get the support of the NRA, and the elected officials they shower money on, the latest proposal now exempts them from disclosing their larger contributors: groups with more than a million members who raised 15 percent or less funding from corporations. Meanwhile, smaller groups across the political spectrum must their reveal their contributors.
The NRA, with more than $322 million in revenue in 2007 and a claimed four million members, appears to be the only group that fits these new criteria. This makes Congress' "cure" for the Citizens United Court decision so outside the spirit of what Congress says it is trying to do that any real supporter of campaign reform should be embarrassed to vote for it.
People are already cynical about the connections between big money and Congress. Now, the big dollar guys would get to avoid the rules once again while the small groups would still have to jump through the hoops in the law.
Given the recent unwillingness of Congress to give D.C. residents a U.S. representative with a vote without also having their court-approved gun laws gutted, and now this reluctance to do campaign finance disclosures without exempting the well-heeled NRA, it seems there is a new condition that must be met before almost any federal legislation is allowed to proceed: Make sure the legislation doesn't upset the gun lobby bosses.
What this deal ultimately would do is create a two-tier system for political speech -- one for the NRA fat cats and the other for everyone else. I strongly urge House members to reflect deeply upon whom it is they are supposed to represent and protect, and oppose this tarnished legislation. I urge every American who wishes to be heard on the most important issues of our time to contact congressional leaders and urge them to stop this proposal.
Paul Helmke is president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. Follow the Brady Campaign on Facebook and Twitter.