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The latest debt deal details

With the default deadline quickly approaching, here's a look at the talking points Speaker John Boehner sent to House members ahead of this evening's debt deal conference call.

Cain tops Perry to take Colorado straw poll

Natalie Gonnella
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As Americans await the outcome of ongoing debt negotiations, in other political news from across the country Herman Cain has claimed the top spot in the latest conservative conference straw poll.

Earning nearly half the ballots cast at the Western Conservative Summit in Denver, the Georgia businessman trumped his GOP competition, with undeclared candidate Rick Perry finishing a very distant second.  According to Politico's Haberman & Burns:

Herman Cain easily won the Western Conservative Summit presidential straw poll Sunday, drawing 246 ballots out of 508 cast and beating his nearest runner-up by a 179-vote margin.

Second-place contender Rick Perry took 67 votes, or 13 percent, to Cain's 48 percent. In third place was Rick Santorum with 50 ballots, or just under 10 percent,

In addition to Perry, the survey also included other unconfirmed candidates like former Ambassador John Bolton, former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan.

As well as appearing in the straw poll, Perry also featured as the event's keynote speaker on Friday night.

The full results of the Western Conservative Summit Straw Poll are included below.

Michele Bachmann -- 9 percent, 44 votes
John Bolton -- 4 percent, 20 votes
Herman Cain -- 48 percent, 246 votes
Newt Gingrich -- 1 percent, 3 votes
Rudy Giuliani -- 0 percent, 0 votes
Jon Huntsman -- 0 percent, 1 vote
Gary Johnson -- 0 percent, 1 vote
Thaddeus McCotter -- 0 percent, 2 votes
Sarah Palin -- 1 percent, 5 votes
Ron Paul -- 2 percent, 12 votes
Tim Pawlenty -- 1 percent, 7 votes
Rick Perry -- 13 percent, 67 votes
Mitt Romney -- 10 percent, 49 votes
Rick Santorum -- 10 percent, 50 votes
Paul Ryan -– 1 vote

So why are all these "extremist" Republicans so obsessed with spending cuts and unwilling to "raise revenue"? This chart will tell you why

Ryan Streeter
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Via Rob Bluey at the Heritage Foundation comes this rather depressing chart.

This is how much the federal government has been spending per household for the past 40 years.

Federal spending per household has risen 162% since 1965.

It's projected to rise another 22% by 2020.

So are you and your family getting your money's worth?

A look at the daily payments needed post August 2

Natalie Gonnella
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August 2 is just two days away, and with fears rising among Americans over the impact of a continued budget gridlock in Washington, the New York Times offers an interesting snapshot of the two week tab facing the US government in the aftermath of the looming debt limit deadline.

Boehner gets some wins in emerging deal, but that won't calm the impatient caucus in the GOP

Ryan Streeter
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There are a number of reports swirling around about the basics of the deal emerging from the halls of the Capitol. This ABC report contains the key points that basically contain the main elements in the various reports.

• A debt ceiling increase of up to $2.1 to $2.4 trillion (depending on the size of the spending cuts agreed to in the final deal).
• They have now agreed to spending cuts of roughly $1.2 trillion over 10 years.
• The formation of a special Congressional committee to recommend further deficit reduction of up to $1.6 trillion (whatever it takes to add up to the total of the debt ceiling increase).  This deficit reduction could take the form of spending cuts, tax increases or both.
• The special committee must make recommendations by late November (before Congress' Thanksgiving recess).
• If Congress does not approve those cuts by December 23, automatic across-the-board cuts go into effect, including cuts to Defense and Medicare. This "trigger" is designed to force action on the deficit reduction committee's recommendations by making the alternative painful to both Democrats and Republicans.
• A vote, in both the House and Senate, on a balanced budget amendment.

Looking over these points and reading similar reports shows just how forceful the freshmen class and the Tea Party have been. There are apparently no new revenue provisions in the initial reduction and in the terms of the special committee. The BBA is in there. One version of the deal says the BBA will be used as the trigger if the Congress doesn't approve the committee's cuts.

But the key downpoints that will foment dissatisfaction: Obama gets the entire ceiling hike in one fell swoop, and it's the cuts that get staggered in two tranches. That will make a lot of people upset. 

Ultimately, it's unclear whether this deal will be big enough to calm the rating agencies' mounting threats of a downgrade.

Senate Republicans slam the Reid plan

Natalie Gonnella
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With the Senate set to vote on a series of deficit reduction proposals starting early tomorrow morning, Republicans today reiterated their opposition to Harry Reid's debt limit plan.

Much like the Democrats recent statement to House Speaker John Boehner, in a letter to the Senate Majority Leader, 43 GOP senators stood firm in their views against the strategy, ensuring the measure will fall short of the seven Republican votes needed to avoid a filibuster.

Republican Senators Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, Scott Brown, and Lisa Murkowski declined to endorse the letter.

According to the Washington Post's Felicia Sonmez:

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) announced on the floor shortly after the chamber convened Saturday afternoon that the senators had delivered the letter to Reid’s office.

Citing insignificant spending cuts and charging the Democrats' with a penchant for political games, here's a look at what GOP senators had to say ahead of tomorrow morning's vote:

Dear Leader Reid:

We are writing to let you know that we will not vote for your $2.4 trillion debt limit amendment which, if enacted, would result in the single largest debt ceiling increase in the history of the United States. In addition to this unprecedented increase in borrowing authority, your amendment completely fails to address our current fiscal imbalance and lacks any serious effort to ensure that any subsequent spending cuts are enacted.

The plan you have proposed would not alter the spending trajectory that is putting our economy and national security at risk. In return for an unprecedented $2.4 trillion debt limit increase, your amendment reduces spending by less than $1 trillion over the next decade. Setting aside the $200 billion shortfall between the CBO scored savings and the $2.4 trillion debt limit increase, identified by the Congressional Budget Office, most of the proposal’s alleged savings are based on a false claim of credit for reductions in war-related spending that were already scheduled to occur. This amendment proposes no change to our military posture and, for that reason, these savings are the sort of widely ridiculed accounting gimmick that breeds cynicism about our ability to tackle our fiscal challenges. The only possible justification for a $2.4 trillion increase in borrowing authority is to allow the President to avoid any accountability for these issues before his 2012 election. It is by constantly putting off these tough decisions that we have found ourselves with a national debt nearly equal to the size of our gross domestic product. The time for action is now, we cannot wait until we accumulate another $2.4 trillion in debt.

For all of these reasons, we must oppose your unprecedented $2.4 trillion debt limit amendment. Given the nation’s enormous future spending challenges, it would be irresponsible to give the President this unprecedented additional borrowing authority without requiring the enactment of significant spending reductions and reforms. We urge you to abandon this reckless proposal and instead pursue a more responsible course of action that would rein in spending, reassure the financial markets, and help promote private sector job growth.

Sincerely,

Republican Leader Mitch McConnell

Republican Whip Jon Kyl

Senator Lamar Alexander

Senator Kelly Ayotte

Senator John Barrasso

Senator Roy Blunt

Senator John Boozman

Senator Richard Burr

Senator Saxby Chambliss

Senator Daniel Coats

Senator Tom Coburn

Senator Thad Cochran

Senator Bob Corker

Senator John Cornyn

Senator Mike Crapo

Senator Jim DeMint

Senator Michael Enzi

Senator Lindsey Graham

Senator Chuck Grassley

Senator Orrin Hatch

Senator Dean Heller

Senator John Hoeven

Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison

Senator James Inhofe

Senator Johnny Isakson

Senator Mike Johanns

Senator Ron Johnson

Senator Mark Kirk

Senator Mike Lee

Senator Richard Lugar

Senator John McCain

Senator Jerry Moran

Senator Rand Paul

Senator Robert Portman

Senator James Risch

Senator Pat Roberts

Senator Marco Rubio

Senator Jeff Sessions

Senator Richard Shelby

Senator John Thune

Senator Patrick Toomey

Senator David Vitter

Senator Roger Wicker

Want to know what $15 trillion looks like?

Natalie Gonnella
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$15 trillion is a staggering amount money, and if the US continues on it's current fiscal path US national debt will topple that figure by Christmas 2011.

As elected leaders attempt to forge a budget deal with just days to go before a US default (and credit downgrade), Los Angeles based engineer Oto Godfrey offers an interesting look at the current debt dilemma. Employing the Statue of Liberty and increments of $100 bills as a means of comparison, Godfrey's infographics provide an extremely worrying visual of the country's fiscal future.

Godfrey's full visual comparison (including a NYC skyline look at unfunded liabilities) is available to view here.

The $917 billion man: Boehner gets his bill, gives Harry Reid his own headaches to deal with, and reminds Democrats we're in a crisis of their making

Ryan Streeter
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Just 9 minutes after the House voted to pass the Boehner plan, Boehner published a piece at NRO, "End this Crisis," in which he speaks of the vote in the past tense. Now that's fast!

His thinking demands a little interpretation and deserves a question. First the two points of interpretation. He writes:

The House demonstrated not arrogance, but leadership today by passing the Budget Control Act, bowing not just to the will of the American people and their desire for a timely and responsible end to this crisis, but also to the Constitution, which gave us the reality of a bicameral legislature.

Interpretation: This bill ain't perfect, folks, but you've got to remember we control one half of one third of the government, which means we are compromised from the beginning. So please, please stop demanding purity from a prostitute.

He also writes:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is a good man. His character is not in question. But the fate of this legislation, and possibly our economy, hinges on his ability to reason with the president, and with his caucus.

Interpretation: Harry Reid may have good character but he's one irrational, political son-of-a-gun. Reason ain't gonna prevail in his doomed chamber.

Boehner knows the fun really begin now as the Senate takes up the bill. He ends his piece this way: "Now it’s time for our colleagues in the Senate to pass it, send it to the president, and bring this crisis to an end."

This is a curious claim. What does he mean by "this crisis"? Our real crisis is bigger than this bill can deliver on (and that's not Boehner's fault, it's the Obama Democrats' refusal to deal with the scale of our spending that must be blamed), so we haven't really averted the "real" crisis. A downgrade may well be on the way despite the bill, even if Reid passed it as is (he won't, of course).

If our economy suffers through a downgrade, regardless of what voters say in 2012, history will not look kindly on the Obama Democrats, and the $917 billion man will look pretty good - at least in textbooks on the art of political negotiation.

Boehner's plan actually cuts more than Reid's, says the CBO, just hours before the Boehner vote

Ryan Streeter
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Everyone knows Senator Reid's supposed military cuts were gimmick based on unrealistic assumptions.

So the CBO came out today with a new score for the bill without the loopy Iraq and Afghanistan assumptions.

The Hill reports:

Without assuming a drawdown in military activities in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Reid bill only cuts the deficit by $909 billion. That's $8 billion less than the $917 billion Boehner plan. With the war funding factored in, the Reid plan cuts $2.176 trillion over 10 years.

As the Boehner bill passes the House and goes to the Senate, the Reid bill is diminished with this new score. It's all the Boehner bill now. We'll see what kind of hatchet job the Senate tries before sending it back to the House, but the GOP definitely has the upper hand at the moment.

Obama's approval rating hits a new low: That'll affect how he treats whatever debt bill reaches his desk

Ryan Streeter
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Gallup reports this afternoon that Obama has hit a new low of 40%.

Gallup notes that this low approval seems related to the low marks Americans have given Obama for how he's handled the debt negotiations.

This trend since last August doesn't look too good for him.\