Ryan Budget Plan Clears House Vote

Posted on Mar 29, 2012

Flickr / Gage Skidmore

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan.

It’s been quite the eventful week in Washington, no? In case the health care hullabaloo at the Supreme Court didn’t bring enough action to our nation’s capital, over in the halls of Congress there was an equally heated debate about Rep. Paul Ryan’s Republican-backed budget plan, which the GOP-heavy House passed Thursday. Not like the Democrat-dominated Senate will be having any of that, but for the moment, Ryan and his cronies are doing a victory lap.  —KA

The New York Times:

“It is so rare in American politics to arrive at a moment in which the debate revolves around the fundamental nature of American democracy and the social contract, but that is exactly where we are today,” said Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, chairman of the House Budget Committee and the architect of the blueprint, adding, “Today’s budget is a vote of confidence for the American experiment.”

Democrats said they saw nothing brave in voting to decimate programs for the poor, like food stamps and Medicaid, while offering potentially huge tax cuts for the rich.

The White House press secretary, Jay Carney, said, “Today’s vote stands as another example of the Republican establishment grasping onto the same failed economic policies that stacked the deck against the middle class and created the worst financial crisis in decades.”

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