On the eve of the government shutdown, Obama remarked that “I shouldn’t have to offer anything”, and that he’s always ready to have a conversation:
“Steve when you say what can I offer? I shouldn’t have to offer anything,” Obama said. “They’re not doing me a favor by paying for things that they have already approved for the government to do. That’s part of their basic function of government; that’s not doing me a favor. That’s doing what the American people sent them here to do, carrying out their responsibilities.
“I have said consistently that I’m always happy to talk to Republicans and Democrats about how we shape a budget that is investing in things like early childhood education, rebuilding our roads and bridges and putting people back to work, growing our economy, making sure that we have the research and development to stay at the cutting edge and that deals with some of our long-term debt issues. But we’re not going to accomplish those things if one party to this conversation says that the only way that they come to the table is if they get 100 percent of what they want and if they don’t, they threaten to burn down the house”
So, let’s do a trip down memory lane to see how Obama’s grand budget ideas have turned out in the last few years.
President Obama’s proposed FY2012 budget was voted down by the Democrat-led Senate 97–0. Not one Democrat or Republican Senator would sponsor it, put his name to it, or vote for it. And that budget was no prize—according to the Congressional Budget Office, that proposal never had an annual deficit of less than $748 billion, would double the national debt in 10 years and would see annual interest payments approach $1 trillion per year.
Obama’s proposed FY2103 budget was defeated in the House of Representatives by a vote of 414-0. That was a $3.6 trillion budget proposal that included, among many things, tax hikes and increased energy spending. No Democrats would even vote for that one either.
Obama submitted his FY2014 budget late by two months, in April of this year. By that time, the House had already created and voted on a budget, as did the Senate (first time for the Senate in a few years). OBama’s FY2014 budget was $3.8 trillion this time, and managed to upset both sides of the aisle — the Republicans because it containted more tax hikes, and the Democrats, because it made systemic changes to Social Security. Incidentially, Obama’s budgets were late 4 out of 5 budget cycles, 2010 being the only year he submitted it on time.
So here we have arrived at a government shutdown. Obama’s recent budgets have been continuously and unilaterally rejected by both the Senate and the House, by both Democrats and Republicans, and we are 1616 days without a budget. So please Mr. Obama, don’t offer us anything more. Your ideas have been tried and found wanting. Get out of the way.