House Republicans Move Forward on 'Cap, Cut and Balance' Deficit-Reduction Plan

GOP Takes New Tack in Debt Talks -- Schedules Vote on 'Cap, Cut and Balance' Pledge

But several House Republicans are questioning whether the Obama administration's Aug. 2 deadline is phony. Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said Friday that the government is funded through Sept. 30, the result of a continuing resolution signed into law this spring. Issa added that President Obama is being "intransigent," and he called the Aug. 2 date "arbitrary" and fabricated.

That would be neat. Ignore the August 2 deadline and see what happens.

A recap of what the plan entails...

House Republicans Propose Cut, Cap, And Balance

Their plan, nicknamed “Cut, Cap, and Balance”, has a three part approach. They call for spending cuts of $380 billion during 2012.

Still not much, but better than anything else they've said before.

The plan calls for a fixed spending cap, allowing the federal government to spend only 18% of Gross Domestic Product.

Which would mean about 2.7 trillion budget... compared to a 3.8 trillion budget right now. So the numbers don't add up.... like that matters in Washington!

Thus the third part of the plan, a balanced budget amendment.

Which would be put in the constitution... good luck with that.

Basically the republicans are pushing a plan that has NO CHANCES of passing.

BTW Obama will make a speech on the debt at 11AM EST... in about 20 minutes. Probably some fear mongering and blaming republicans. Obama is saying nothing new.

Republicans just said they are aiming for a vote in the house next week.

Well it didn't make sense... well now it's even worse than that.

LA Times

At the same time, Republican leaders orchestrated a series of public moves intended to soften the blow for conservatives. They agreed to give the House an opportunity to vote on two top conservative priorities: a so-called cut-cap-and-balance bill, which would order $111 billion in cuts in federal programs for 2012 and impose a cap on future spending, and a constitutional amendment that would require a balanced federal budget.

111 billion in cuts... Better than Obama's plan of cutting 2 billion next year...

So first they said they would cut about half the deficit next year... or about 800+ billion. Then they said they would cut 381 billion... now they are saying 111 billion... in reality, I bet it's gonna be less than 111 billion.