GOP budget plan passes House

WASHINGTON -- Republicans pushed an election-year, $3.5 trillion budget through the House yesterday that relies on biting spending cuts and a revamping of Medicare to curb massive federal deficits, drawing a sharp contrast with how President Barack Obama and Democrats would tackle the nation's fiscal problems.

House passage came on a near party-line 228-191 vote. With its doom virtually guaranteed in the Democratic-run Senate, the House measure was essentially a political stage on which Republicans showed voters how they would run Washington if they win control in the November elections -- and Democrats fired back by doing the same.

The GOP plan features sharper deficit reduction and starkly less government than Democrats want. It would block Obama's proposal to boost taxes on the wealthy and would instead lower income tax rates while erasing many unspecified tax breaks. Obama would raise taxes on families making above $250,000 and on oil and gas companies, add funds for roads and schools and cull modest savings from domestic programs.

"We think America is on the wrong track," said House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), the GOP plan's chief author and a rising party star sometimes mentioned as a vice presidential prospect. "We think the president is bringing us to a debt crisis and a welfare state in decline."

Democrats accused the GOP of writing a plan that would end the age-old guarantee that Medicare would cover most of seniors' medical bills and would slash transportation, research and other programs far too deeply, even as the measure would protect the rich from Obama's proposed tax hikes.

"The more people know about that budget, the more people know it hurts them in their lives," said Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Congress' budget is a nonbinding road map that suggests tax and spending changes lawmakers should make in separate, later legislation. A House-Senate stalemate over the fiscal blueprint would have scant practical impact as Congress tackles what little budget work it is expected to address before the November elections.

Final approval in the House came after lawmakers swatted down a slew of alternatives over the past two days, including a package by the most conservative Republicans that featured even sharper spending cuts and deeper deficit reduction than Ryan's leadership-backed plan.