* Boehner offers downbeat assessment of talks
* Speaker calls for Obama to make a counteroffer
By Thomas Ferraro and Richard Cowan
WASHINGTON, Dec 7 (Reuters) – Republican House Speaker John
Boehner accused U.S. President Barack Obama of pushing the
country toward the “fiscal cliff” on Friday and of wasting
another week without making progress in talks.
With three weeks left before a combination of steep tax
hikes and deep spending cuts kicks in unless Congress
intervenes, Boehner said the administration had adopted a “my
way or the highway” approach and was engaging in reckless talk
about going over the cliff.
“This isn’t a progress report because there is no progress
to report,” Boehner told reporters at the Capitol. “The
president has adopted a deliberate strategy to slow-walk our
economy right to the edge of the fiscal cliff.”
The bleak report from Boehner prolonged the economic
uncertainty surrounding the cliff, which has already riled
markets, slowed down business decisions and disrupted the
budgeting processes for government at all levels across the
country.
Economists say going over the cliff could throw the economy
back into a recession.
Obama has called for extending the tax cuts set to expire on
Dec. 31 for middle-class taxpayers but letting them rise for the
wealthiest 2 percent of Americans. Boehner and Republicans
oppose his plan, preferring to find new revenues by closing
loopholes and reducing deductions.
Boehner characterized as “reckless talk” Treasury Secretary
Timothy Geithner’s comment this week that the administration was
prepared to go over the cliff if tax rates for the wealthiest
were not increased.
The downbeat assessment was in line with what Boehner has
offered for weeks as the two sides hold their ground on Obama’s
call for raising tax rates and Republican calls for cuts in
entitlements like the Medicare and Medicaid healthcare programs
for seniors and the poor.
Congressional aides said there were no plans for meetings on
the issue this weekend. F uture talks will be limited to Boehner
and Obama and their staffs as the deadline approached, aides
said.
Boehner said his telephone conversation with Obama on
Wednesday and renewed staff talks on Thursday had not made any
progress.
‘MORE OF THE SAME’
“The phone call was pleasant, but it was just more of the
same. Even the conversations the staff had yesterday were just
more of the same. It’s time for the president, if he’s serious,
to come back to us with a counteroffer,” Boehner said.
Boehner and the House of Representatives leadership
submitted their terms for a deal to the White House on Monday,
after Obama offered his opening proposal last week.
The plans from both sides would cut deficits by more than $4
trillion over the next 10 years but differ on how to get there.
Republicans want more drastic spending cuts in entitlement
programs, while Obama wants to raise more revenue with tax
increases and to boost some spending to spur the sluggish
economy.
Vice President Joe Biden said the administration was
prepared to consider “any serious offer” from Republicans and
“theoretically” could negotiate how high tax rates must rise.
“The top brackets have to go up,” Biden said during a visit
to a Virginia diner. “Theoretically, we can negotiate how far
up, but we think it should go – the top rate should go to 39.6
percent.”
Boehner also did not rule out a compromise on raising tax
rates on the richest Americans. Potential options include
boosting the rates above the current 35 percent but short of the
39.6 percent rate proposed by Obama, or raising the income
threshold higher than the $250,000 sought by the White House.
“There are a lot of things that are possible to put the
revenue that the president seeks on the table,” Boehner said.
With polling showing most Americans would blame Republicans
if the country goes off the cliff, more House Republicans have
been urging Boehner to get an agreement quickly, even if it
means tax hikes for the wealthiest.
But Boehner could have a challenge selling an eventual
agreement to conservative Tea Party sympathizers in the House,
some of whom are openly critical of the concessions the speaker
has already made.
Boehner has been under fire from the right for proposing
$800 billion in new revenue and for removing from House
committees four conservative Republican lawmakers who were seen
as bucking the leadership.
“When he couples this conservative purging with a negotiated
tax increase of $800 billion, we are starting to see more and
more signs that he’s not dedicated to fiscally conservative
beliefs,” Andrew Roth of the influential anti-tax group Club for
Growth told Fox News.
Once the question of whether to raise tax rates is resolved,
the two sides will try to figure out a way to deal with the
spending cuts, perhaps postponing or trimming them. They will
also work toward a longer-term deficit-reduction package to be
taken up after the new Congress is sworn in next month.
At a news conference on Friday, House Democratic leader
Nancy Pelosi threw her support behind a White House proposal to
give Obama power to raise U.S. borrowing authority without
legislation from Congress.
The debt ceiling issue, which provoked a 2011 showdown that
led to a downgrade of the U.S. credit rating, has become
entwined in the fiscal cliff debate. The debt limit will need to
be raised in the next few months.
“The White House and House Democrats are on the same page on
the debt ceiling,” Pelosi said.
