The unkindest of cuts

Friday, Feb. 11, 2011 | 2:01 a.m.

Republican leaders in the House of Representatives had lunch at the White House on Wednesday to talk about the budget and other issues with President Barack Obama.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the president thought it was a “very constructive” meeting, with a basic understanding that spending and the size of the deficit needed to be cut. House Speaker John Boehner said they found “enough common ground, I think, to assure the American people that we are willing to work on their behalf and willing to do it together.”

But Boehner’s assessment appears to have been premature. Boehner’s Republican caucus doesn’t appear willing to work with anyone, including its leadership. House Republicans broke with their leadership on a handful of votes this week that were expected to be routine. On Wednesday, rank-and-file Republicans rebelled against the leadership’s budget plan.

The House Appropriations Committee’s leadership had planned on Thursday to roll out a proposal to cut $40 billion from the budget this fiscal year, which ends in September. But in a Republican caucus meeting Wednesday, far-right members objected, saying the number was too low. They wanted the $100 billion of cuts promised in the party’s “Pledge to America.” Republican leaders said the $100 billion would be cut over the calendar year, not the fiscal year, saying it was too much too soon. The Wall Street Journal reported that Rep. Hal Rogers of Kentucky, the House Appropriations Committee chairman, warned that larger cuts could result in the layoffs of air traffic controllers and FBI agents.

It was to no avail. Rogers and the Republican leadership folded. On Thursday, Rogers announced that his committee would make $100 billion in cuts. Some of the proposals are stunning, including cuts of:

• more than $1 billion for local and federal law enforcement, including a $600 million reduction in a program designed to put more police on the streets;

• more than $3 billion in Energy Department programs, including those designed to develop renewable energy sources;

• more than $1.6 billion from the Environmental Protection Agency;

• more than $2 billion in health programs, not to mention steep cuts in the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Other cuts target programs that help the poorest Americans, not to mention those designed to protect the nation’s health and safety like food inspection. As well, job training and economic development programs would see significant cuts.

The House Republican leadership has shamefully cast its lot with the Tea Party, and that could prove disastrous for the nation. The budget plan would cut American jobs, harm the economy and set back recovery efforts. It is also divisive. Instead of working with Democrats to find ways to wisely cut the government, Republicans want to do it their way — or not at all.

Congress needs to pass a budget resolution by March 4 or else government will shut down, and this plan puts the House on a dangerous course. Neither the Senate nor the president will approve it, but Republicans appear more concerned about their own agenda than moving the country forward.

That’s awful. Americans need help, not blind ideology.