President Obama today called the GOP budget, passed by the Republican-controlled House last week, “thinly veiled Social Darwinism,” and added it was a “Trojan Horse disguised as a deficit reduction plan.” The President made the remarks in a speech (full video, below)Â at the Associated Press Luncheon today.
Calling it “the fieriest speech of his presidency,” Brian Beutler at Talking Points Memo reported:
Obama decried key planks of the Republican agenda — particularly calls for large tax cuts for wealthy Americans, and a plan to phase out traditional Medicare — which he took care to describe accurately, though in hostile terms.
And in response to questions from the audience, Obama urged the press not to confuse rancor over the parties’ competing visions for the country as typical partisan bitterness for which Democrats and Republicans are equally culpable.
Chiding Republicans for not learning anything from the failure of trickle-down policies that defined the last decades, Obama attacked the GOP budget head-on. “They have proposed a budget so far to the right it makes the Contract for America look like the New Deal,†he said. “In fact, that renowned liberal, Newt Gingrich, first called the original version of the budget radical. He said it would contribute to right-wing social engineering. … This is now the party’s governing platform. This is what they are running on. One of my potential opponents, Gov. Romney, has said he hopes a similar version of this plan from last year would be introduced as a bill on Day One of his presidency.â€
The Wall Street Journal reported:
Administration officials pitched the speech as a follow to remarks the president gave in December in Osawatomie, Kan. There, he said it was inexcusable that some people couldn’t get into the middle class and he blamed Republicans for enabling irresponsibility with loose regulations.
Mr. Obama continued that tone today, saying Republicans were attempting to “impose a radical vision on our country.”
Their vision, he said, includes gutting the things the U.S. needs to grow—education and training and research and development—and is “a prescription for decline.” Mr. Obama said the Republican budget would “dramatically” reduce benefits the middle class receive for health care, retirement and homeownership.
C-SPAN adds:
The Republican budget plan, approved by the House last week last, cuts $5.3 trillion over the next ten years through deeps cuts in spending and entitlements.
President Obama spoke at the same Associate Press Luncheon four years ago when he was running for president. With this year’s appearance, the President joins every sitting president since Calvin Coolidge in addressing an Association Society of News Editors audience.
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http://www.c-spanvideo.org/videoLibrary/assets/swf/CSPANPlayer.swf?pid=305289-1