WASHINGTON, D.C. —
Across-the-board spending cuts all but certain, Republicans and Democrats in the Senate are staging a politically charged showdown designed to avoid public blame for any resulting inconvenience or disruption in government services.
The two parties drafted alternative measures to replace the cuts, but officials conceded in advance the rival measures were doomed.
At the White House, President Barack Obama invited congressional leaders to discuss the issue with him on Friday — deadline day for averting the cuts, which would slash $85 billion from the military and domestic programs alike.
Democrats controlling the Senate are pushing a $110 billion plan that would block the cuts through the end of the year. They would carve 5 percent from domestic agencies and 8 percent from the Pentagon but would leave several major programs alone, including Social Security, Medicaid and food stamps, while limiting the cuts to Medicare to a 2 percent reduction to health care providers like doctors and hospitals.
The Democratic plan proposes $27.5 billion in future-year cuts in defense spending, elimination of a program of direct payments to certain farmers, and a minimum tax rate on income exceeding $1 million as the main elements of an alternative to the immediate and bruising automatic cuts, known in Washington-speak as a “sequester.”
Republicans were sure to kill the Democratic alternative with a filibuster. They were poised to offer an alternative of their own that would give Obama the authority to propose a rewrite to the 2013 budget to redistribute the cuts. Obama would be unable to cut defense by more than the $43 billion reduction that the Pentagon faces and would be unable to raise taxes to undo the cuts.
The idea is that money could be transferred from lower-priority accounts to accounts funding air traffic control or meat inspection. The White House says such moves would offer only slight relief, but they could take pressure off Congress to address the sequester.
Democrats are sure to vote the GOP measure down.
Both the House and the Senate are set to send their members home Thursday afternoon, even as the deadline to avoid the cuts looms the next day.
AP story section
February 28, 2013
Senate Democrats, GOP to stage votes on rival cuts
- AP story section
-
-
HIV-infected teacher's aide accused of molestation
ST. LOUIS -- An Illinois special-needs teaching assistant accused of molesting a teenage student in school while knowingly infected with HIV remained jailed Tuesday as police investigated another claim of similar misconduct by the man involving a dif
-
Tougher threshold recommended
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- States should cut their threshold for drunken driving by nearly half -- from .08 blood alcohol level to 0.5 -- matching a standard that has substantially reduced highway deaths in other countries, a U.S. safety board recommends. T
-
Scranton shared close bond
SCRANTON, Pa. -- NBC's long-running "The Office" was a faux documentary about cubicle life. The Scranton branch of Dunder Mifflin Paper Co. didn't exist. Try telling that to merchants, tourism officials and regular folks here in the real-world city
-
King, Messiah: New baby names suggest high hopes
WASHINGTON — Talk about high expectations for a newborn: King and Messiah are among the fastest-rising baby names for American boys. They're just a little behind Major, the boy's name that jumped the most spots on the Social Security Administration
-
Crowds swoon, but Prince Harry is all business
The British soldier-prince is spending most of his week in the U.S. honoring the wounded and the dead of war, a salute that began Thursday at a land-mine exhibition in Congress at the side of one of America's most storied wounded warriors, Sen. John McCain.
-
Suspect in Ohio kidnappings due in court
CLEVELAND (AP) -- Three women found alive after a decade in captivity endured lonely, dark lives inside a dingy home where they were raped and allowed outside only a handful of times in disguises while walking to a garage steps away, investigators sa
-
Former US official describes Libya attack
A former top diplomat in Libya on Wednesday delivered a riveting minute-by-minute account of the chaotic events during the deadly assault on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi last September, with a 2 a.m. call from Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and confusion about the fate of U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens.
-
Punk finds its place in hallowed halls of Met
NEW YORK — Punk and high fashion can now share the same stage, and a new Costume Institute exhibit at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, "Punk: Chaos to Culture," celebrates that influence. It's an enduring irony that probably makes punk's rebellious o
-
FDA wants cancer warnings on tanning beds
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Indoor tanning beds would come with new warnings about the risk of cancer and be subject to more stringent federal oversight under a proposal unveiled Monday by the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA has regulated tanning beds
-
Survey: US home prices up 10.5 pct. in past year
A survey shows U.S. home prices rose 10.5 percent in March compared with a year ago, the biggest gain since March 2006.
- More AP story section Headlines
-
