Reply #36: President Obama: "Everything on the table" in deficit fight

[Better Believe It]

"Everything on the table" in deficit fight
By Patricia Zengerle and Caren Bohan
February 18, 2010

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama named a bipartisan panel on Thursday to tackle exploding U.S. budget deficits and promised it broad leeway to put the country on a path to fiscal responsibility.

"Everything's on the table. That's how this thing's going to work," Obama told reporters after tapping former White House chief of staff Erskine Bowles, a Democrat, and former Senator Alan Simpson, a Republican, to lead the 18-member commission.

Obama's comment suggested that the panel would have latitude to consider any proposals to cut government spending -- which he warned had become extravagant -- and raise taxes.

The president had promised during his campaign that families making less than $250,000 would not face tax increases but recently said he was "agnostic" about whether middle-class tax increases could be considered by the panel.

"Their selection as co-chairs indicates that the Obama administration is serious about making this process work," said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, whose similar proposal failed in the Senate last month.

The commission has been called a way to provide political cover for Obama and Congress in case they make unpopular decisions such as raising taxes to close the budget gap.

Obama acknowledged the difficulty but said the trend has to be stopped.

"Since the budget surpluses at the end of the 1990s federal debt has exploded," he said. "The trajectory is clear and it is disturbing. But the politics of dealing with chronic deficits is fraught with hard choices and therefore it's treacherous to office-holders here in Washington."

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE61F5TC20100218