l****z
发帖数: 29846 | 1 By Mark Felsenthal
WASHINGTON | Wed Dec 5, 2012 6:24am EST
(Reuters) - President Barack Obama will renew his case for tax hikes on
wealthy Americans to avert a year-end fiscal crunch and call for a smooth
increase in the nation's borrowing limit in a speech to a business group on
Wednesday, a White House official said.
The president is embarked on an aggressive campaign to pressure
congressional Republicans to compromise on steps to avoid the so-called
fiscal cliff. He will argue to corporate executives that it would hurt the
nation's economy to have another protracted political fight over raising the
debt limit, the official said.
"The President will highlight why it would hurt our economy and our nation's
businesses if we do not find a solution to avoid another debt ceiling
crisis, and will ask the business leaders for their help in supporting an
approach that resolves the debt limit without drama or delay," said the
official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
It was the reluctance of congressional Republicans to agree to such an
increase in 2011 without deep spending cuts that brought the nation to the
brink of default. The result was a historic lowering of the U.S. credit
rating and a setback to the recovery from a recession that ended in 2009.
The statutory ceiling on U.S. Treasury borrowing is $16.4 trillion. The
nation is expected to hit the legal limit near the year's end, although it
can tap emergency measures to stave off a default and keep the government
running into early 2013.
If Congress fails to raise the borrowing cap, analysts expect the Treasury
would run out of options to avoid a default some time in the latter half of
February. That forecast could change depending on how the administration and
Congress deal with the fiscal cliff at the end of the year.
Obama is due to deliver remarks to the Business Roundtable, an association
representing chief executives of large U.S. firms, at 10:50 a.m. (1550 GMT).
The president and congressional Republicans are currently battling over how
to avoid automatic tax increases and deep spending cuts. The president wants
to extend expiring tax cuts for all but the wealthiest Americans while
Republican leaders are dug in against allowing any taxes rises at all.
The president will renew his insistence that taxes rise on the most affluent
Americans in his speech to the business group, the White House official
said.
If the administration and lawmaker remain at loggerheads, going over the
fiscal cliff is projected to throw the weak economy back into recession.
Obama, re-elected to a second term last month in part on a pledge to raise
taxes on the wealthy, has sought to pressure Congress into yielding on tax
increases with a stream of meetings with a wide range of interest groups,
including businesses, non-profits, and governors of states.
"The president will continue to make the case that our nation's businesses
need the certainty that middle class families won't see their taxes go up at
the end of the year," he said.
(Reporting By Mark Felsenthal; Editing by Eric Walsh) | l****z
发帖数: 29846 | 2 “The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is
a sign of leadership failure. It is a Sign that the US Government cannot
pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial
assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless
fiscal policies. …Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and
internationally. Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here’. Instead,
Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our
children and Grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of
leadership. Americans deserve better.”
SENATOR BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, MARCH 2006 |
|
