The US House of Representatives has passed Rep. Paul Ryan's FY 2013 budget, largely along party lines. The final vote was 228-191, with the vast majority of Republicans voting for passage, with every Democrat and a small handful of Republicans voting no (some of whom supported a more ambitious proposal). The House has thus fulfilled its legal obligation under the 1974 Budget Act, and has done so on time. For a picture of what this blueprint would do if implemented, read my comprehensive summary. Some highlights:
(1) It reduces spending and eventually balances, unlike any Democrat alternatives, such as they even exist.
(2) It restores spending and revenue levels to their historical norms of roughly 20 and 18 percent, respectively, by 2015.
(3) It reduces deficits by $3 Trillion compared to President Obama's over the next decade, and begins to control our growing national debt.
(4) It lowers, flattens, and simplifies personal and corporate income taxes while limiting and eliminating spending in the tax code.
(5) It uses a bipartisan framework to reform and save a crashing Medicare program for future seniors.
(6) It repeals Obamacare in its entirety.
Last night, the House unanimously defeated President Obama's reckless budget by a vote of 414-0. The chamber also defeated three other budget alternatives (see the updates for details). For the third consecutive year, the Democrat-controlled Senate will violate the law by not offering any budget resolution. Last year, Harry Reid & Co did manage to vote on and kill four Republican budget proposals -- and the GOP forced a vote on the president's 2012 budget. Not a single Democrat "yes" vote was recorded on any of the proposed resolutions. Obama's plan went down in flames, 0-97. We'll likely see a re-run of that show later this year.
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UPDATE - Here's video of some delightfully nuanced and persuasive Democratic arguments against the Ryan budget (via the Free Beacon):
UPDATE II - Paul Ryan's closing argument, just prior to passage:
UPDATE III - Andrew Stiles consults the budget scoreboard:
503 to 0. For those keeping score at home, that is the most recent count of “yes” votes received by the competing budget proposals offered by Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) and President Obama, in that order, over the past two years.
Stiles awards Senate Democrats a "did not participate."
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