Where Do We Stand?

There is lots of news on the budget front but where it leaves us is most unclear.

From the Washington Post:

Having difficulty finding consensus within their own ranks, House Republican leaders have begun courting moderate Democrats on several key fiscal issues, including a deal to avoid a government shutdown at the end of next week.

The basic outline would involve more than $30 billion in cuts for the 2011 spending package, well short of the $61 billion initially demanded by freshman Republicans and other conservatives, according to senior aides in both parties. Such a deal probably would be acceptable to Senate leaders and President Obama as long as the House didn’t impose funding restrictions on certain social and regulatory programs supported by Democrats, Senate and administration aides said.

The fact that Republican leaders have initiated talks with some Democrats shows some division within House Republicans just two months after taking over the House.

From The Hill:

Conservatives are turning to a new message in the escalating budget fight: A government shutdown is not actually a shutdown.

It’s a “slowdown,” according to the new refrain from Tea Party leader Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.). Or as House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) put it on Monday, the stalemate over spending could cause the government “to partially shut down.”

From the New York Times:

The most visible element of the budget fight in Congress is the one over the scale of spending cuts this year. But increasingly, other deeply contentious policy issues that House Republicans insist must be addressed in any budget deal are as much of a stumbling block as the final dollar figure.

They include efforts to take away money to carry out the new health care law, to limit regulation by the Environmental Protection Agency and to cut federal financing for organizations like Planned Parenthood that provide abortions. ...

While two sides can ultimately agree on dollars, coming together on ideologically polarizing policy matters is far more difficult: Some things you are either for or against.

From the National Journal:

In a purely symbolic move in the ongoing budget and spending cut negotiations, House Republicans plan to pass on Friday a measure called the “Prevention of a Government Shutdown Act. Passage will do nothing to avoid a government shutdown ...

According to TPM, the Prevention of a Government Shutdown Act "would deem controversial Republican spending cut legislation the law of the land if Congress blows past an April 6 deadline."

From the Associated Press:

Democrats indicated Tuesday they may be willing to accept Republican-backed curbs on the Environmental Protection Agency and other federal regulators as part of an overall deal on spending cuts, a rare hint of compromise in private negotiations marked by public rancor.