Budget cuts begin as sides trade blame

Sequester spurs calls to Hill from irate constituents

WASHINGTON, March 3, (Agencies): President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans have refused to concede any share of the blame for failing to stave off automatic spending cuts that will slash $85 billion in federal spending.

The still-fragile US economy braced itself Saturday for the gradual but potentially grave impact of the across-the-board cuts, which took effect Friday night at the stroke of Obama’s pen. Hours earlier, he and congressional leaders emerged from a White House meeting no closer to an agreement.

Even as Democrats and Republicans pledged a renewed effort to retroactively undo the spending cuts, both parties said the blame rests squarely on the other for any damage the cuts might inflict. There were no indications that either side was wavering from entrenched positions that for weeks had prevented progress on a deal to find a way out: Republicans refusing any deal with more tax revenue and Democrats snubbing any deal without it.

“None of this is necessary,” Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday. “It’s happening because Republicans in Congress chose this outcome over closing a single wasteful tax loophole that helps reduce the deficit.”

The president said the cuts would cause “a ripple effect across the economy” that would worsen the longer they stay in place, eventually costing more than 750,000 jobs and disrupting the lives of middleclass families.

Obama and the Republicans have been fighting over federal spending since the opposition party regained control of the House of Representatives in the 2010 midterm elections. The budget cuts were designed in 2011 to be so ruthless that both sides would be forced to find a better deal, but they haven’t despite two years to find a compromise.

Remainder

The $85 billion in cuts apply to the remainder of the 2013 fiscal year, which ends Sept 30. But without a deal they will continue slashing government spending by about $1 trillion more over a 10-year period.

The immediate impact of the spending cuts on the public was uncertain.

The Pentagon will absorb half of the $85 billion required to be sliced between now and the end of the budget year on Sept 30, exposing civilian workers to furloughs and defense contractors to possible cancellations. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, only a few days on the job, said: “We will continue to ensure America’s security” despite the challenge posed by an “unnecessary budget crisis.”

Still, fear and anger are consuming military communities, where economies are deeply tied to the forces there. Preparing for a worstcase scenario, Navy officials have plans to force mandatory furloughs on roughly 186,000 civilian employees across the country. Shipyards from coast to coast have outlined cost-cutting plans to delay huge maintenance contracts on nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers.

Oklahoma has five military installations. Chris Spiwak, owner of Chequers Restaurant and Pub outside Tinker Air Force Base in Midwest City, said he’s afraid he might have to lay off an employee or two.

“We have customers telling us that if they’re furloughed, they won’t be coming in as much,” Spiwak said. “That’s their expendable income. They’ll be eating at home or bringing their lunches.”

Earful

The US Congress is getting an earful about the big spending cuts beginning to hit government services from worried and irate constituents, including one senator’s own spouse.

Democratic Senator Thomas Carper of Delaware said his wife, “my most important constituent,” asked him, “Why can’t you guys get your act together? Do you know what people think of you guys?”

“I told her that Washington needs to work more like Delaware,” said Carper, a former governor of the state. “In Delaware, Democrats and Republicans work together.”

They have not worked together in Washington. And so the acrossthe-board cuts of the so-called “sequester” - which both Republicans and Democrats have said they oppose — took effect Friday night after President Barack Obama and Republican leaders failed to agree on a way to replace them with targeted spending reductions.

Up until the final few days before Friday, when the reductions began because of a law enacted in 2011, constituents urged, some begged, lawmakers to avert them.

The cuts threaten the US economic recovery, could disrupt federal services from airports to national parks, and may force furloughs of hundreds of thousands of federal workers and employees of federal contractors, the administration says.

“They want to kill us Senator Orrin Hatch, a Republican, said of his stituents.

Laura Zayner, a senior officer with the US Department of Homeland Security at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, was among 400 federal workers facing possible furloughs who came to Washington last week to lobby Congress.

“We consider the furlough a slap in the face. We take it personally,” Zayner said. “We are not picking sides, Democrats or Republicans. But we want them to do their jobs and stop the cuts.” all,” Utah con-