Monday, February 13, 2012
3:53 PM
Ryan rips White House budget as 'failure of leadership;' Kind calls it 'a good step'
Early reviews of the president's fiscal year 2013 budget proposal are mixed from members of the Wisconsin delegation.
The White House rolled out the president's $3.8 trillion budget this morning -- a proposal that includes new funding for infrastructure and education while ending Bush administration high-income tax rates and implementing mandatory spending and entitlement program cuts.
At an event in Virginia, the president said the budget reflects "shared responsibility."
"It says that if we’re serious about investing in our future and investing in community colleges, and investing in new energy technology, and investing in basic research, well, we’ve got to pay for it," Obama said. "And that means we've got to make some choices."
But U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, blasted the budget as a "dismal failure of leadership," charging that it breaks the president's promise to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term in office.
"This budget does nothing to prevent the bankruptcy of critical programs, threatening the health and retirement security of current and future seniors. Worse, it continues the President’s policy of letting an unaccountable board of bureaucrats cut Medicare in ways that will lead to denied care for seniors," the Janesville Republican said in a statement. "The broken promises and recycled gimmicks contained in this budget have dramatically widened this President’s growing credibility deficit."
U.S. Rep. Ron Kind, D-La Crosse, praised the proposal as "a good step and the start of a larger conversation the President is going to need to have with Congress and the American people about how to put our country on a long-term sustainable path."
"Smart investments in areas like education, infrastructure, manufacturing and worker training are important for economic growth," Kind said in a statement. "But we have to stay focused on rising health care costs, the major cost driver in all budgets – federal, state and local as well as for most family and business budgets."
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