Democrats' scramble to beat new deadline: Scott Brown's arrival

In his State of the Union address last night, President Obama called for a three-year freeze in government spending, starting in 2010, with the exception of spending related to national security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.

But even before the address, the Senate had begun work on a measure that would cap spending for five years, beginning in fiscal year 2010. Moreover, the measure would limit spending on overseas deployments to $130 billion in FY 2010 and $50 billion for each of the next four years.

With 56 votes, the measure failed to get the 60 needed to prevent a filibuster. But notably, this vote did not split along party lines: 39 Republicans and 16 Democrats, mainly relative newcomers to the Senate, backed the amendment.

“I am very concerned about where we are fiscally,” said Sen. Bob Corker (R) of Tennessee, after the vote. “For a guy here for three years, it’s striking to see the lack of structure and culture for fiscal discipline here.”

Sen. Claire McCaskill (D) of Missouri, a cosponsor of the amendment with Sen. Jeff Sessions (R) of Alabama, echoed Senator Corker's sentiment. “If you look at Democrats who voted for the spending freeze, most have been in the Senate three years or less,” she said. “They have a different take on what it takes to keep our fiscal house in order.”

Senate majority leader Reid said the 56-to-44 vote was not a rejection of the president’s proposal to rein in discretionary spending. Senators on the appropriations committee “understand how important it is that we freeze domestic discretionary spending. That doesn’t mean we can’t move things around within the framework of the money that we have,” he added. “And we’re going to do that.”

And now the bad news: the debt

In a hearing before the Senate Budget Committee Thursday, Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Elmendorf told senators that if current laws
and policies remain unchanged, the federal budget would show a deficit of about $1.3 trillion for fiscal year 2010.

“By the end of 2020, the debt is projected to climb to $15 trillion or 67 percent of GDP,” he said. CBO projects that the government’s annual spending on net interest will more than triple between 2010 and 2020, from $207 billion to $723 billion.

“It’s good for the president to talk about a spending freeze,” said Senator Sessions. “I assume he’ll stand by his ... threat" to veto any budget where discretionary spending is not balanced.

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