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politics and politicians Title: Freshman Democrat Joe Manchin: Obama has 'failed to lead' on budget West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin ripped President Barack Obama on his budget proposals in a Senate floor speech Tuesday, a rare rebuke from a freshman Democrat who clearly is worried about the politics of deficit spending as he faces a tough reelection in 2012. Manchin charged the president with failing to lead the way in reducing spending, while also criticizing Republicans for offering “partisan” and “unrealistic” budget proposals. “Why are we doing all this when the most powerful person in these negotiations — our president — has failed to lead this debate or offer a serious proposal for spending and cuts that he would be willing to fight for?” The full-throated rejection of the president’s spending proposals by a politically vulnerable Democrat is just the latest worrisome sign for Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), who have yet to rally their party around a unified spending plan. Indeed, Democratic leaders are having trouble just keeping moderates on board — Sens. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) also have expressed skepticism that Democrats are willing to cut enough spending to satisfy voters and make a dent in the deficit. Manchin will vote against both the Senate Democrats’ proposal, which will cut $10.6 billion below current spending levels and the House Republican version of the continuing resolution, which would cut $61 billion. The Senate is expected to vote on both this week, perhaps as early as Tuesday, and neither is expected to pass. The government will run out of money on March 18 if there’s no compromise on federal spending, but it’s clear from Manchin’s comments that Democrats have work to do on their side of the aisle while Republicans put up a unified front on spending cuts. Congress has been engaged in “political theater,” Manchin said. “Why are we voting on partisan proposals that we know will fail, that we all know don’t balance our nation’s priorities with the need to get our fiscal house in order?” The remarks were first reported in POLITICO’s Huddle on Tuesday morning. “Respectfully,” Manchin said, “I am asking President Obama to take this challenge head on and propose a compromise plan for dealing with the our nation’s fiscal challenges.” The White House declined to comment on Manchin’s remarks. The bills proposed by both Democrats and Republicans take the wrong approaches, Manchin argued. The Democratic bill includes $6.5 billion in cuts and “utterly ignores our fiscal reality — our nation is badly in debt and spending at absolutely unsustainable and out-of-control levels,” he said. “We must turn our financial ship around, but the Senate proposal continues to sail forward as if there’s no storm on the horizon.” But Republicans’ spending plan for the rest of the year is “an even more flawed measure,” Manchin said. The GOP bill “blindly hacks the budget with no sense of our priorities or of our values as a country.” Instead, Congress and the nation need the president’s leadership to work out a bipartisan compromise, Manchin said. “I know it’s not easy. I know that it takes compromise. I know it will be partisan and difficult. I know that everyone will have to give up something and no one will want to relinquish anything. But that is what the American people demand.” Other Senate Democrats have expressed similar misgivings about the bill put forward by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), saying it doesn’t go far enough to put the country on the right fiscal footing. In language not nearly as bold as Manchin’s, McCaskill, who also faces a tough reelection battle in 2012, said Monday she was unsure of whether she’d vote for her party’s bill. “I feel the cuts are not large enough, but there are some cuts, so I don’t know whether I’ll be for it or against it,” she said. “But I know it doesn’t go as far as we need to go.” Asked whether she’s looking for a middle option between the Republican and Democratic plans, McCaskill quipped: “I’m the Mama Bear,” a reference to the “Three Bears” children’s story. Nelson, another vulnerable Democrat targeted by the GOP in the 2012 campaign, told POLITICO that he’s been reviewing both proposals and would decision by Tuesday. “We’ve been reviewing them, and they’re not close enough yet. But I’m going to make my announcement [Tuesday],” Nelson said. “I don’t know if it’s in the middle. It might be closer to the top.” Democratic leaders, however, have suggested they’re unwilling to slash any more out of the budget, saying such cuts would kill 700,000 jobs, harm education programs and stifle innovation. And while Reid is watching his centrist Democrats stray, he also has to worry about liberals getting disenchanted by the race to cut more and more spending. “I’m willing to see more deficit reduction, but not out of domestic discretionary spending. I think we’ve pushed this to the limit,” Majority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, said during an appearance on “Fox News Sunday.” Reid on Monday acknowledged that this week’s votes were purely symbolic. Neither plans have secured the 60 votes required to pass. “We’ve all done the math, and we all know how these votes will turn out: Neither proposal will pass, which means neither will reach the president’s desk as written,” he said. “We’ll go back to square one and back to the negotiating table.” But Reid and others say the votes will highlight the difference between those who are “responsible” and “reckless.” “They will show us which senators are serious about fortifying our long-term future, and which are more concerned with scoring short-term political points. These votes will show us who wants an easy applause line and who wants to strengthen our nation’s bottom line,” Reid said. “And as the two parties’ vastly different proposals make clear, there is a fine line between a responsible budget and a reckless one.” Jonathan Allen, Manu Raju and Shira Toeplitz contributed to this story.
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