IT DID not take long for Barack Obama to crave the wind in his hair again. Several weeks of Sisyphean efforts at building a bipartisan consensus on his $800 billion (€618 billion) stimulus plan appear to have won the White House very little support from an increasingly hostile opposition.
Of the 218 elected Republicans on Capitol Hill, just three have come out in support of the president’s plan – and even their support cannot be guaranteed.
With an increasing urgency to his efforts, Mr Obama will today take his case to the voters in Elkhart, Indiana, in the kind of “town hall” setting that was a daily event during his 21-month election campaign. Tomorrow he will repeat the performance in Florida.
And tonight he holds his first prime-time presidential press conference. There is no guarantee that any of this will work. In spite of pushing his Democratic colleagues in the Senate to broker a compromise with the three Republicans on Friday night that cut more than $100 billion in spending from the stimulus package and added in new tax cuts, most Republican opposition appears only to have hardened over the weekend.
More than 40 per cent of the $827 billion Senate Bill comes in the form of tax cuts, compared with 30 per cent in the $819 billion Bill that passed the House.
“We’re going down a road to disaster,” Richard Shelby, the senior Republican on the Senate banking committee, said yesterday. “There’s got to be some other way better than what we’re doing. Not the socialist way but to try and get our free market working again.”
Nor do Mr Obama’s efforts appear to be winning applause from his own support base, which is increasingly agitated about the substance of the compromises that were agreed in the Senate.
Liberal economists point to the fact that the $40 billion in education aid to state governments was among the most stimulative elements in the original Bill.
Even Lawrence Summers, Mr Obama’s chief economic adviser, yesterday sounded disappointed, pointing out that the several billion dollars that was cut in aid to higher education would have fed rapidly through into the economy.
“Look, I have children at college,” Mr Summers told Fox News. “And I know that if you put money in their pocket it won’t be saved . . . The president was very strongly criticised by many in his own party – he cannot do any more [than he has so far] in walking down the road to bipartisanship.”
Mr Obama’s next priority is to ensure that Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, wins a closure vote this afternoon to put an end to further debate in the Senate.
Should Mr Reid achieve that – which would require the support of the three Republicans who negotiated Friday night’s compromise, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and the two senators from Maine, Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe – then the final passage of the Bill on Tuesday ought to be a formality.
That would leave two critical hurdles to clear, which could take at least several more days of valuable time. First, the Senate and House versions must be “reconciled” in a bicameral conference.
This is where the White House and House Democrats may try to restore some of the spending cuts that were lost in the Senate. Then the reconciled version must be passed by both houses.
Again, Mr Reid will need 60 votes in the Senate to prevent a Republican filibuster. “We fully understand the criticisms of some economists about this compromise,” said a senior Democratic staffer yesterday. “But they don’t have to get the Bill passed. If we unpick the compromise in the final version then we could be back to square one.”
After the compromise was announced on Friday, John McCain, the former presidential candidate, pronounced his verdict on Mr Obama’s bipartisan efforts.
If Mr McCain's words are any guide at all, Mr Obama faces an even rockier week than the last one. "I've been involved in a lot of bipartisan legislation around here," Mr McCain said. "But I guarantee you, this is not bipartisan." – ( Financial Timesservice)
Recovery plan: what is expected to happen next
The US Congress is weighing two versions of an economic stimulus package of tax cuts and spending programmes aimed at pulling the economy out of its downward spiral.
Here is what is expected to happen next:
The Senate is expected to vote at about 10.30pm Irish time tonight to limit the debate on the stimulus package. Democrats, who control the Senate with 58 seats, need 60 votes to end debate and they have picked up support from at least three Republican senators.
The Senate tomorrow is expected to vote on an amendment to slim down its version to roughly $827 billion from $937 billion. It is expected to pass with support from Republican senators Susan Collins, Arlen Specter and Olympia Snowe.
If the Senate approves the legislation, likely to happen tomorrow, it will need to be reconciled with the different version that passed the House of Representatives with a $819bn price tag. A group of lawmakers from each chamber will be appointed by party leaders to resolve the differences.
Lawmakers will have to sort scores of differences, from spending priorities to tax cuts and incentives, a process that could take several days or longer.
President Barack Obama will travel to two cities hit hard by the ailing economy – Elkhart in Indiana today and Fort Myers in Florida tomorrow – to hold town meetings where he will try to build support for the stimulus package.
Once a compromise is reached between the lawmakers, the House and Senate would have to vote on the final version before it could be sent to the president for his signature or veto. – (Reuters)