Republicans Unite in Opposition to Obama Budget

The House of Representatives passed a budget resolution yesterday which closely tracks the $3.6 trillion spending plan submitted by President Barack Obama. Later, the Senate passed a slightly smaller version of the budget, handing the White House a small political victory. But that victory was tempered by Republicans in both chambers, who united to vote unanimously against both bills. The House GOP was joined by 20 moderate Democrats in the bipartisan vote against the plan, which passed 233-198. Earlier, Democrats easily defeated the Republican alternative budget, which relied on a combination of spending and tax cuts to help reduce the federal deficit.

At the beginning of the year, House Republicans twice united to vote unanimously against the president's $787 billion economic stimulus bill. Though criticized at the time, those votes later proved to be prescient, as a provision in the stimulus bill protecting bonuses paid to top executives at financial firms like AIG that received federal bailout money came to light. The controversy over the bonuses seemed to confirm Minority Leader John Boehner's (R-OH) charge that lawmakers had scarcely read the stimulus bill in the Democrats' rush to pass it by President's Day. The resulting firestorm focused squarely on Democrats who wrote and voted for the bill. Republicans have been able to use the controversy to stoke public anger at what they call the reckless spending of the Obama Administration and Congressional Democrats, something they would not have been able to do to as much effect if some Republicans had voted for the stimulus bill. On the budget resolution, Republicans similarly hope their unanimous opposition will improve their image with the voting public as the party of fiscal responsibility in advance of the 2010 mid-term Congressional elections.

Democrats, meanwhile, have labeled Republicans the party of "no" for their opposition to Democrat spending plans. And Democrats simultaneously criticize Republicans for what they see as the out of control spending of the Bush years, when Republicans controlled both houses of Congress for four years. But federal spending in any of those years did not come close to the $3.6 trillion Democrats plan to spend this year. Add in the $787 billion stimulus and the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, both of which passed primarily on the strength of Democratic votes, and the total spending level recently approved by Democrats in Congress reaches more than $5 trillion dollars. Republicans see that kind of spending as a whole lot of reasons to say no.