House voting on GOP bill _ key step in debt fight

House voting on GOP bill _ key step in debt fight

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio walks to a meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, July 28, 2011, as debt talks continue.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- As Thursday's crucial vote neared, Republican leaders convinced a growing number of their fractious rank and file to support a House plan to stave off an unprecedented government default. Many of the chamber's GOP freshmen, crucial to passage, were climbing aboard, but leaders stopped short of claiming victory.

If the House approved the bill, it would bring President Barack Obama and congressional leaders a step closer to endgame efforts for a debt-limit solution before Tuesday's deadline.

At an afternoon news conference, Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said the House would act on legislation that he called "a sincere, honest effort to end this crisis." Rival Democratic leaders moved ahead on the assumption that Boehner would prevail in rallying Republicans to back the legislation.

Republicans are seeking deep spending cuts in exchange for raising the nation's $14.3 trillion debt limit to allow the government to keep paying its bills. The White House has threatened to veto the GOP bill if it makes it through the Democratic-controlled Senate. Still, getting the newly modified House plan passed on Thursday was seen as an important step toward finding a compromise - possibly in the Senate.

Rival plans by Boehner and Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid have enough in common - including the establishment of a special congressional panel to recommend additional spending cuts this fall - that Reid has hinted a compromise could be achievable.

As debate got under way in the House, Reid said the Senate would vote on the GOP bill as soon as the House finished late Thursday - and predicted it would fail in his chamber.

"No Democrat will vote for a short-term Band-Aid that would put our economy at risk and put the nation back in this untenable situation a few short months from now," Reid said.

Earlier in the day, in a closed-door GOP meeting, Boehner, R-Ohio, made headway in securing the 217 votes necessary to pass his plan. No Democrats were expected to support it. Boehner told the Republicans he expected to round up enough votes but was not there yet.

"But today is the day," he said, according to people in the room.

Later, Boehner said the bill "is as large a step as we're able to take at this point in time that is doable and signable and to become law," he said.

Standing with Boehner, Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., who counts the votes, offered no numbers, but said they were moving in the right direction.

The bill passed an early hurdle as the House voted 238-186 along party lines to move forward on the legislation.

Some lawmakers were climbing behind it, though sometimes grudgingly.

"I think it's the best deal we can get," said Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Ohio, who said he had dropped his opposition. Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C., said he would back the measure to ensure that Boehner "has a seat at the table" for the final negotiations.

Critical to Boehner is support from his chamber's 87 freshmen, who lifted the GOP to its House majority last November, many of them with tea party support from the right. More than a dozen freshmen told reporters that a significant number of their class were now backing Boehner's plan

"It is not a perfect plan, certainly, but it is a good step forward," said Rep. Tim Griffin, R-Ark., one of the newcomers.

The White House expected Boehner to rally enough Republicans for the measure, with adviser David Plouffe saying it will "pass out of the House in partisan fashion." The House has 240 Republicans and 193 Democrats with two vacancies. Boehner can only afford to lose two dozen members.

Wall Street warily watched the standoff in Washington. Stocks rose modestly for much of the day, then faded. The Dow Jones industrial average declined 62 points, the fifth straight daily drop.

The Treasury Department moved ahead with plans to hold its regular weekly auction of three-month and six-month Treasury securities on Monday. The department said it would provide additional information on how it would pay its bills if the deadline should pass without an increase in the nation's borrowing authority.

While the Boehner and Reid measures differ in key details, they also share similarities that underscore the concessions made by the two sides in recent days. Reid's bill does not envision a tax increase to reduce deficits, a bow to Republicans. But neither does the House measure require passage of a constitutional balanced budget amendment for state ratification, a step in the direction of Obama and the Democrats.

At the White House, spokesman Jay Carney said, "What a compromise looks like is pretty clear: significant deficit reduction, a mechanism by which Congress would take on the tough issues of tax reform and entitlement reform, and a lifting of the debt ceiling beyond -- into 2013, so that we do not have the cloud of uncertainty that is hanging over our economy right now."

In the House, Boehner made headway with balky conservatives unhappy that the measure contains smaller spending cuts than a more-stringent debt measure that passed the House last week. The new measure depends on caps on agency budgets to cut more than $900 billion from the deficit over the coming decade while permitting a commensurate increase in the nation's borrowing to allow the government to pay its bills.

Boehner argued that the measure represented "the best opportunity we have to hold the president's feet to the fire. He wants a $2.4 trillion blank check that lets him continue his spending binge through the next election. This is the time to say no." Boehner made the comments Wednesday to conservative radio host Laura Ingraham.

The White House threatened a veto, saying the bill did not meet Obama's demand for an increase in the debt limit large enough to prevent a rerun of the current crisis next year, in the heat of the 2012 election campaign.

"It's inconceivable to me that the president would actually follow through on this threat," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Thursday.

McConnell accused Democrats of "playing with fire" in planning to block the Boehner proposal in the Senate.

Obama supports an alternative drafted by Reid that contains comparable cuts to agency operating budgets but also claims savings from lowball estimates of war costs. Reid's plan would provide a record-breaking $2.7 trillion in additional borrowing authority, enough to tide the government over through 2012. Reid, however, is plainly short of the votes needed to overcome a GOP filibuster.

Unless Congress acts by Tuesday, administration officials say, the government will not be able to pay all its bills. They include $23 billion in Social Security benefits due Aug. 3, an $87 billion payment to investors to redeem maturing Treasury securities and more than $30 billion in interest payments that come due Aug. 15.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and other officials warn that a default could prove catastrophic for an economy still recovering from the worst recession in decades. But some skeptics, including conservative Republicans like Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, say Geithner can manage Treasury's cash flow to avoid a catastrophe if Congress fails to act.

House Republicans tweaked their measure Wednesday to enhance its prospects of passage after a worse-than expected cost estimate from congressional budget analysts on Tuesday. The changes were modest, but under arcane budget conventions, they brought projected savings for 2012 to $22 billion, part of a 10-year cut of $917 billion. That would trigger a $900 billion increase in the debt limit.

Boehner showed fire in a meeting Wednesday with the Republican caucus.

"Get your ass in line," Boehner told the rank and file. "I can't do this job unless you're behind me."

The speaker still faced resistance.

Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, said he is still "a beat up no" vote after Thursday's session.

Plouffe was interviewed on MSNBC.

Hope for debt deal, despite disputes, veto threat

Hope for debt deal, despite disputes, veto threat

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., center, flanked by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nev., left, and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., gestures during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, July 27, 2011, to talk about the conflicting plans to deal with the debt crisis.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Crisis concerns rising, House Republican leaders shrugged off a White House veto threat and an outbreak of tensions within their own party Wednesday as they built support for legislation to stave off the government default threatened for next week. Worried Wall Street sent stocks plunging on fears that political gridlock would prevail.

"I can't do this job unless you're behind me," House Speaker John Boehner bluntly told his fractious rank and file in the run-up to a scheduled Thursday vote on the bill, which was hastily rewritten to show deeper spending cuts than 24 hours earlier.

With Boehner facing a major test of his leadership, the While House disparaged the measure he was working so hard to pass. Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada called it "a big wet kiss for the right wing," and all 51 Senate Democrats and two independents pledged to scuttle it if it cleared the House.

The White House has threatened a veto, saying the bill does not meet President Barack Obama's demand for an increase in the debt limit large enough to prevent a rerun of the current crisis next year, in the heat of the 2012 election campaign.

Instead, Obama supports an alternative drafted by Reid that also cuts spending, yet provides enough additional borrowing authority to tide the government over through next year.

For all the bluster, there were hints that a compromise might be near.

"Magic things can happen here in Congress in a very short period of time under the right circumstances," said Reid, the Senate majority leader.

Without legislation in place by Aug. 2, administration officials say the Treasury will not be able to pay all the nation's bills, possibly triggering a default that could prove catastrophic for an economy still recovering from the worst recession in decades.

Two days after Obama and Boehner made unprecedented back-to-back speeches on national television, there was evidence that the debt crisis was becoming a national cause of concern.

Shawn Bonner of Boerne, Texas, said, "I don't think the people who are making the decisions live in the same environment we do." She said of the two sides: "They've both dug in their heels for political statements, and we need them to make decisions to help the country." She was in Tennessee, touring the State Capitol.

The U.S. financial markets posted big losses for the day as political leaders maneuvered. The Dow Jones industrial average fell nearly 200 points and appeared headed for its worst week in nearly a year.

"Confidence in our political system is beginning to fade." said Channing Smith, managing director of Capital Advisors Inc. "As hours pass and the uncertainty builds, I think the market is starting to price in the potential that we might not have a solution by Aug. 2."

In Washington, across from the Capitol, a few dozen tea party activists rallied - and appeared as divided as the conservatives in the House. Some issued an online call for Boehner to resign as speaker, while others said he deserved time to try and strike the best deal possible.

The Republican legislation underwent revisions to increase its prospects of passage.

That meant changes that brought projected savings for 2012 to $22 billion, part of a 10-year cut of $917 billion in all that would trigger a $900 billion increase in the debt limit. The bill also would establish a special committee of lawmakers to recommend additional cuts that would trigger additional borrowing authority if approved.

While the two parties' bills differed in key details, they also shared similarities that underscored the concessions made by both sides in recent days. Reid's bill does not envision a tax increase to reduce deficits, a bow to Republicans. But neither does the House measure require both houses to approve a constitutional balanced budget amendment for state ratification, a step in the direction of Obama and the Democrats.

For Boehner, the House vote shaped up as a critical test of his ability to lead a majority that includes 87 first-term lawmakers, many of them elected with tea party support. Passage was also imperative to maximize the leadership's leverage with Obama and Reid in a fast-approaching endgame.

The speaker was direct in the meeting with rank-and-file GOP lawmakers on Wednesday. "Get your ass in line," he told them. "I can't do this job unless you're behind me."

If House conservatives torpedo the bill, any follow-up would probably require Democratic votes to pass. That, in turn, would mean smaller spending cuts than Republicans are seeking in exchange for raising the nation's $14.3 trillion debt limit.

As Thursday's vote approached, some Republicans seemed to be swinging behind the legislation, however reluctantly.

"Rep. Bill Huizenga, a first-term lawmaker from Michigan, said he was undecided how to vote, but he added, "This is about as good as it's going to get. That's a pretty strong argument."

"Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and President Obama are going to be surprised tomorrow night," said Rep. Allen West, a Florida first-term Republican. "I'll bet my retirement check on it. I'm a conservative. I'm going to support this."

Republicans control 240 seats in the House, compared with 193 for the Democrats, and there was strong opposition from some conservatives.

"I don't know where the votes are today," said Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, a leader of the Republican Study Committee, an organization of conservative Republican lawmakers who often have disagreed with the leadership. "I just know that I am against the bill."

But Jordan felt obliged to open a closed-door meeting of the GOP rank and file during the day by apologizing for the actions of two aides. Officials said one sent an email to outside organizations suggesting they lobby some RSC members who were wavering on the debt limit bill. A second aide recounted details of an earlier GOP closed-door meeting in an email he had sent.

As Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., read one of the emails aloud, there were scattered calls to "fire him," referring to the aide responsible. The officials who described the events did so on condition of anonymity, saying they were not authorized to disclose details from a closed-door meeting.

Across the Capitol, Reid played a waiting game, scheduling no votes until Boehner could show he could prevail in the House.

The White House rejected one proposed way out of the crisis.

Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn suggested the president unilaterally raise the debt limit, citing a clause in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution that says the validity of the nation's public debt "shall not be questioned."

Obama said several days ago he had consulted with White House lawyers on that point and they were unenthusiastic about the idea.

At the White House, Carney was dismissive of the suggestion. "There are no off-ramps. There is no way around this. There is no escape," he said."

Lawmakers generally have been assuming they would need to approve an additional $2.4 trillion in borrowing authority to make sure the Treasury could handle the nation's finances beyond the 2012 elections.

Yet a $2.2 trillion increase would suffice, based on assumptions in a letter that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner sent to Congress in April. He wrote that the country's borrowing was increasing by an average of $125 billion a month. Additionally, the government must repay the $237 billion cost of the extraordinary measures it has been taking since May 16 to avoid breeching the $14.3 trillion debt limit.

Conservative ire threatens GOP debt plan in House

Conservative ire threatens GOP debt plan in House

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, right, accompanied by Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., gestures while speaking at The Republican National Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, July 26, 2011.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Thwarted by conservatives in his own Republican Party, House Speaker John Boehner scrambled Tuesday to secure enough GOP votes to beat a fast-closing Aug. 2 deadline and stave off the potential financial chaos of the nation's first-ever default.

At the same time, public head-butting between Democratic President Barack Obama and the Republicans showed no sign of easing. The White House declared Obama would veto the Boehner bill, even if it somehow got through the House and the Democratic-controlled Senate.

For all that, it was the tea party-backed members of Boehner's own party who continued to vex him, and heavily influence the debt and deficit negotiating terms - not to mention his chances of holding on to the speakership.

Their adamant opposition to any tax increases forced Boehner to back away from a "grand bargain" with Obama that might have made dramatic cuts in government spending. Yet when Boehner turned this week to a more modest cost-cutting plan, with no tax hikes, many conservatives balked again. They said the proposal lacked the more potent tools they seek, such as a constitutional mandate for balanced budgets.

Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, chairman of a large group of conservative Republicans, sent a tremor through the Capitol Tuesday when he said he doubted Boehner had enough support to pass his plan Wednesday, when it is scheduled for a vote. The Boehner bill would require congressional action to raise the debt ceiling this summer, and again before the 2012 elections.

Obama strongly opposes that last requirement, arguing that it would reopen the delicate and crucial debt discussions to unending political pressure during next year's campaigns.

The president supports a separate bill, pushed by Majority Leader Harry Reid in the Democratic-controlled Senate, that would raise the debt ceiling enough to tide the government over through next year - and the elections.

Boehner wasn't helped by an official congressional analysis late Tuesday that said his plan would produce smaller savings than originally promised - less than $1 trillion in spending cuts over the coming decade rather than the $1.2 trillion he estimated on Monday.

Earlier, responding to the conservative Republican opposition, Boehner quickly went on Rush Limbaugh's radio show, then he began one-on-one chats with wavering Republicans on the House floor during midday roll call votes.

"He has to convince a few people," Rep. Tom Petri, R-Wis., observed dryly from a doorway.

A serious, almost dire urgency ran through Boehner's efforts. The clock was ticking down to next Tuesday's deadline to continue the government's borrowing powers and avert possible defaults on U.S. loans.

Congressional veterans say a final-hour bargain can't be reached until both parties irrefutably prove to themselves and the public that neither the Democrats' top goals nor the Republicans' can be reached in the divided Congress.

Moreover, Boehner's grasp on the speakership could be weakened if he fails to pass the debt-ceiling plan that bears his name. Assuming no more than five Democrats support the measure - the same number that backed a GOP balanced-budget bill last week - Boehner can afford to lose no more than 28 of the House's 240 Republicans.

His allies predicted he'll make it, and Boehner got a vocal endorsement from his sometimes rival, Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va. But holdouts were not limited to the much-discussed freshman class, elected in the tea party-fueled 2010 elections.

"He can't get my vote because I felt like that, for long-term solutions to this problem, all these promises we make in cutting spending never seem to occur," said Rep. Phil Gingrey, R-Ga. " I've been here nine years and I've never seen it happen yet."

Six-term Rep. Jeff Flake of Arizona, a long-time critic of deficit spending, said he also was leaning against Boehner's bill even though he knows a tougher measure cannot be enacted. "Obviously you have to weigh that against passing something that just doesn't solve the problem," Flake said.

Major business groups weighed in. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce urged support of Boehner's bill, while the conservative Club for Growth denounced it as too weak.

While Boehner searched for votes, some Americans seemed to edge closer to notion that the Aug. 2 deadline might pass without a solution. The stock market fell again, although not dramatically. California planned to borrow about $5 billion from private investors as a hedge against a possible federal government default.

The White House spoke with veterans' groups about what might happen to vets' benefits if a deal isn't reached. Obama has said he can't guarantee Social Security checks and payments to veterans and the disabled would go out on schedule.

The Senate worked on other issues, waiting to see if Boehner's bill would pass the House and come its way. Reid, D-Nev., said the Boehner bill could not pass his chamber.

Reid has his own plan. Like Boehner's, it would identify about $1.2 trillion in spending cuts to the day-to-day operating budgets of government agencies. Reid's proposal, however, would require only one congressional vote to raise the debt ceiling before the 2012 elections. And it counts an extra $1 trillion in savings from winding down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Both proposals would create a bipartisan congressional commission to identify further deficit reductions, especially in major health care programs such as Medicare and Medicaid.

For seven months, tea party-backed House members - freshmen and veterans alike -have rewritten congressional traditions. Speakers typically can twist arms, offer favors and issue veiled threats to round up the needed support on tough votes. It's possible Boehner will be able to do so on the debt-ceiling matter.

But many tea party activists abhor political compromise. They insist that their elected officials stand on principle, regardless of the consequences.

"A lot of the tea party guys owe certain support groups," said Rep. Walter Jones Jr., R-N.C. He said he had not decided how to vote on Boehner's bill.

Freshman Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., bristles at the notion that tea party-influenced newcomers are sheep-like ideologues willing to risk default. "We're not a bunch of knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing Neanderthals," Gowdy said. "We're interested in answering what we perceive to be the mandate, which is to stop the spending and change the way Washington handles money."

Gowdy said he was leaning against Boehner's proposal.

But freshman Rep. Allen West, R-Fla., a tea party favorite, felt otherwise.

"This Boehner plan, does it have everything that I want in it?" West said. "Absolutely not. It is the 70-75 percent plan that we can go forward with."

Petri, a 33-year House veteran, said Boehner may need the votes of 35 to 40 Democrats, which Democratic leaders say is impossible.

Asked how Boehner will get out of his predicament, Petri paused and said: "When I think of it, I'll give him a call."

GOP, Dems both unveil debt plans; Obama to TV

GOP, Dems both unveil debt plans; Obama to TV

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, center, joined by other GOP leaders, criticizes President Obama and Congressional Democrats for failure to end the debt crisis, Monday, July 25, 2011, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Monday, July 25, 2011. From left are, Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, Boehner, Rep. David Dreier,, R-Calif., and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Va.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- In a fresh outbreak of brinkmanship, first Republicans, then Democrats drafted rival fallback legislation Monday to avert a potentially devastating government default in little more than a week.

President Barack Obama readied a prime-time nationally televised speech on short notice amid the gridlock. One official said he would call for compromise.

The official said Obama would quote Ronald Reagan - a hero to many conservatives - who said during his presidency that failure to raise the debt ceiling would do "incalculable damage."

Underscoring the dramatic standoff, several networks agreed to carry rebuttal remarks afterward by House Speaker John Boehner.

Despite warnings to the contrary, U.S. financial markets have appeared to take the political maneuvering in stride - so far. Wall Street posted losses Monday but with no indication of panic among investors.

Without signed legislation by day's end on Aug. 2, the Treasury will be unable to pay all its bills, possibly triggering an unprecedented default that officials warn could badly harm a national economy struggling to recover from the worst recession in decades.

Obama wants legislation that will raise the nation's debt limit by at least $2.4 trillion in one vote, enough to avoid a recurrence of the acrimonious current struggle until after the 2012 elections.

Republicans want a two-step process that would require a second vote in the midst of a campaign for control of the White House and both houses of Congress.

There were concessions from both sides embedded in the competing legislation, but they were largely obscured by the partisan rhetoric of the day.

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky urged Obama to shift his position rather than "veto the country into default."

And Reid jabbed at tea party-backed Republicans who make up a significant portion of the House GOP rank and file. The Nevada Democrat warned against allowing "these extremists" to dictate the country's course.

The measure Boehner and the GOP leadership drafted in the House called for spending cuts and an increase in the debt limit to tide the Treasury over until sometime next year. A second increase in borrowing authority would hinge on approval of additional spending cuts sometime during the election year.

Across the Capitol, Reid wrote legislation that drew the president's backing, praise from House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi - and criticism from Republicans.

By design or not, the two sides' harsh remarks obscured concessions that narrowed the differences among the nation's political leaders as they groped for a way to resolve the economic crisis.

With their revised plan, House Republicans backed off an earlier insistence on $6 trillion in spending cuts to raise the debt limit.

And Obama jettisoned his longstanding call for increased government revenues as part of any deficit reduction plan.

Pending the president's televised speech, the White House also declined repeatedly to say whether Obama would veto the revised House measure.

White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer called the proposal "not a serious attempt to avert default because it has no chance of passing the Senate."

Not all Republicans were happy with their leadership's decision to scale back legislation that had cleared the House last week, only to die in the Senate.

Among House conservatives who have provided the political muscle for the Republican drive to cut spending, the revised legislation was a disappointment. "I cannot support the plan," said Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, one of the leading advocates of legislation that cleared the House last week and died in the Senate.

But two rank-and-file Republicans said their constituents were voicing concerns other than the rising federal debt.

Rep. Tom Rooney, R-Fla., said his office is getting calls from constituents saying, "If I don't get my Social Security check, it's your fault."

Rep. Tom Reed, a New York freshman, said many of his constituents are telling him to stand firm in his drive to cut spending. "But I will admit there's some anxiety in the district" about Social Security and other programs, he added.

As Boehner readied his legislation, Senate Democratic leaders called a news conference to announce their own next steps.

The Democrats' measure would cut $2.7 trillion in federal spending and raise the debt limit by $2.4 trillion in one step - enough borrowing authority to meet Obama's bottom-line demand.

The cuts include $1.2 trillion from across a range of hundreds of government programs and $1 trillion in savings assumed to derive from the end of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Boehner ridiculed the $1 trillion in war savings as gimmicky, but in fact, they were contained in the budget the House passed earlier in the year.

The legislation also assumes creation of a special joint congressional committee to recommend additional savings with a guaranteed vote by Congress by the end of 2011.

Yet in the maneuvering it appeared another of the president's long-held conditions appeared to be in danger of rejection.

Neither Boehner's measure nor the one Reid was drafting included additional revenue, according to officials in both parties.

In addition to a two-step approach to raising the debt limit, the House measure would require lawmakers in both houses to vote later this year on a constitutional amendment requiring a balanced federal budget.

An earlier bill, passed in the House last week but then scuttled in the Senate, would have required Congress to approve an amendment and send it to the states for ratification.

That same bill would have made $6 trillion in spending cuts in exchange for raising the debt limit.

Obama promised to veto that bill even before the House voted on it.

Each side offered accounts of secret maneuvering designed to put the other side in a poor light.

Democratic officials said Obama called Boehner on Saturday night, one day after the collapse of compromise talks, and offered to reduce his demand for new tax revenue by $400 billion.

In return, Obama said that he wanted Republicans to abandon their demand to cancel parts of the year-old health care law if future deficit cuts did not materialize.

This official said Boehner rejected the proposal on Sunday.

Republicans disputed that account - and offered one of their own.

In their version of events, Reid agreed on Sunday night to a two-step approach to raising the debt limit that Obama has rejected.

Democrats denied it.

None of the officials involved would agree to be quoted by name.

"Fulfilling My Destiny" Gospel Concert & Book Release (Sunday, July 24, 2011)

"Fulfilling My Destiny" Gospel Concert & Book Release (Sunday, July 24, 2011)

Couples wed on 1st day gay marriage is legal in NY

Couples wed on 1st day gay marriage is legal in NY

Phyllis Siegel, 76, right, kisses her wife Connie Kopelov, 84, after exchanging vows at the Manhattan City Clerk's office with New York City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn in attendance, back left, on the first day New York State's Marriage Equality Act goes into effect, on Sunday, July 24, 2011.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Hundreds of gay couples dressed in morning suits, gowns and T-shirts recited vows in emotion-choked voices and triumphantly hoisted their long-awaited marriage certificates on Sunday as New York became the sixth and largest state to recognize same-sex weddings.

Couples began saying "I do" at midnight from Niagara Falls to Long Island, though New York City became the sometimes raucous center of action by daybreak Sunday as couples waited on a sweltering day for the chance to exchange vows at the city clerk's office.

Thousands of protesters rallied in several cities around the state, a signal that the long fight for recognition may not be over just yet.

But a party atmosphere reigned in the lobby of the Manhattan clerk's office, with cheers and applause breaking out whenever a couple was handed their white-and-blue wedding certificate. Balloons floated overhead. One couple wore matching kilts; another wore sparkly crowns. Children scurried up and down the lobby; workers with bullhorns called out the numbers of each couple.

Poignant signs of pent-up emotion were common from couples who had in some cases waited for years to wed. Couples cried and voices quavered. Newlywed Douglas Robinson exclaimed, "You bet your life I do!" when asked if he would take Michael Elsasser as his spouse.

The first couple to marry in Manhattan were Phyllis Siegel, 77, and Connie Kopelov, 85, who have been together for 23 years. Kopelov arrived in a wheelchair and stood with the assistance of a walker. During the service, Siegel wrapped her hand in Kopelov's hand and they both grasped the walker.

Witnesses cheered and wiped away tears after the two women vowed to honor and cherish each other as spouses and then kissed.

"I am breathless. I almost couldn't breathe," Siegel said after the ceremony. "It's mind-boggling. The fact that's it's happening to us - that we are finally legal and can do this like everyone else."

Outside afterward, Siegel raised her arms exultantly as Kopelov, in the wheelchair, held out a marriage certificate.

New York's adoption of legal same-sex marriage is viewed as a pivotal moment in the national gay rights movement and was expected to galvanize supporters and opponents alike. The state joined Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont, along with Washington, D.C., when it voted last month to legalize gay marriage.

Protest rallies were planned in Manhattan, Buffalo, Rochester and Albany on Sunday afternoon. Gay marriage opponents unhappy that Gov. Andrew Cuomo and lawmakers legalized same-sex marriage last month are calling for a statewide referendum on the issue.

Several hundred people crowded into the street across from Cuomo's Manhattan office to protest the new law. They waved signs saying "Excommunicate Cuomo" and chanted "Let the people vote!"

"I'm here for God's sake," said Steve Rosner, 65, of the Lower East Side. "To sanctify same-sex marriage is an abomination. It's beyond belief."

Hundreds more protested on the steps of Buffalo's City Hall and at the state Capitol in Albany.

Clerks in New York City and about a dozen other cities statewide opened their doors Sunday to cater to same-sex couples. In New York City and other locations, judges waived a mandatory 24-hour waiting period that allowed couples to exchange vows moments after receiving their licenses.

In Manhasset on Long Island, Dina Mazzaferro and Robin Leopold of Great Neck got married in the North Hempstead town clerk's office with their 8-year-old daughter, Sasha, and Robin's mother, Barbara, watching. The elder woman wiped away tears during the brief ceremony while Sasha mouthed some of the words along with her parents.

The couple has been together 15 years.

"We've been waiting for this day," Leopold, an attorney who works in the Queens district attorney's office, said after the service. "And now we're waiting for the day it becomes legal on a federal level. It's a wonderful thing that the town has been so embracing of this."

Across the state in Buffalo, the first in line were Daniel Rodgers, 54, and Scott Klaurens, 40, who were married in shorts, T-shirts and sneakers. They had gone expecting only to get a license and planned to wed Tuesday, but were told they could go ahead Sunday because of their marriage six years ago in Toronto.

"This is just a flower opening up for us and everyone else, a flower of equality," Rodgers said.

At Buffalo City Hall, City Clerk Gerald Chwalinski zipped a black robe over his shorts and golf shirt and spent three hours marrying couples in the ornate City Council chambers. His office issued 20 licenses and performed 8 ceremonies in the three hours it was open for the occasion Sunday.

In Syracuse, officials issued licenses to 25 same-sex couples and eight of them were granted waivers. Of the 15 same-sex couples granted licenses in Binghamton, one was from neighboring Pennsylvania and three were from New York City; five of those couples were getting married Sunday.

Initially, New York City officials had projected that about 2,500 couples might show up at the city clerk's offices hoping to get married on Sunday, but by the time a 48-hour lottery had drawn to a close on Thursday, 823 couples had signed up - 59 more than the city had planned to accommodate. The city said it would perform ceremonies for all 823.

The festive atmosphere included couples who posed for pictures in front of a photo backdrop of City Hall and bought T-shirts saying "I got married in New York City" from the clerk's office gift shop. In Brooklyn, an elegant reception was held in Borough Hall with champagne and a lineup of cakes - one with a two-men cake topper, another with two women and a third with a heterosexual couple.

There were some glitches, though. In Brooklyn, Eufemio Torres and John Torres were told incorrectly by a city employee that they could not wed Sunday because Eufemio had only a Mexican passport.

"Our hearts sank. But I'm a fighter, and we were not going home," said John Torres, a legal secretary.

Soon after speaking with the Brooklyn borough president's chief of staff, the pair stood before a judge in the hall's elaborately wood-carved main chamber. Eufemio Torres cradled a bouquet of white lilies and orchids, and the men took their wedding vows.

The day began with some couples exchanging vows right after midnight. In Niagara Falls, gay rights activists Kitty Lambert and Cheryle Rudd were legally married the very first moment they could be during a midnight ceremony.

With the rainbow-lit falls as a backdrop, Lambert, 54, and Rudd, 53, were among the first gay couples to tie the knot with the blessing of the state. Lambert and Rudd, who have 12 grandchildren between them, have been together for more than a decade and had long been fighting for the right to marry.

The couple, both from Buffalo, smiled broadly as they exchanged traditional marriage vows, promising to love and cherish each other in sickness and in health. A crowd of several hundred people cheered as they were pronounced married and shared their first kiss.

"What an incredible night this was," said Lambert, who wore an electric blue satin gown with a sequined train for the ceremony and carried a bouquet of blue hydrangeas. "Everything was absolutely perfect."

In Albany, Mayor Jerry Jennings performed marriages at 12:01 a.m. Sunday in the Common Council's chambers.

Boehner: GOP ready to act alone on debt deal

Boehner: GOP ready to act alone on debt deal

In this photo provided by NBC News, White House Chief of Staff William Daley appears on NBC's "Meet the Press" in Washington Sunday, July 24, 2011. Congressional leaders in Washington planned to work on a fiercely hot Sunday to try to reach a bipartisan accord to avert a debt-ceiling crisis on Aug. 2.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Scrambling to head off disaster, House Speaker John Boehner on Sunday readied a plan to prevent the first government default in U.S. history and said Republicans would act alone if Democrats didn't go along. The White House said President Barack Obama would veto a plan that failed to extend the nation's borrowing power into 2013 as time for action drew dangerously close.

On a day of deepening tension, Boehner hoped to outline at least a framework of a deal by 4 p.m. EDT that could get through a divided Congress and avert panic before Asian financial markets opened hours later. The government is on pace to run out of money to pay its bills unless the debt cap is raised by Aug. 2.

Boehner's plan, still under negotiation on Capitol Hill, would likely cut spending by at least $1 trillion and extend the federal borrowing limit by a slightly smaller dollar amount, into 2012. That's intended to get the nation beyond this crisis and snag enough votes from House Republicans who won't raise the debt limit without spending cuts, too.

"I would prefer to have a bipartisan approach to solve this problem. If that is not possible, I and my Republican colleagues in the House are prepared to move on our own," said Boehner, R-Ohio.

Deeper and more complex reductions in the nation's deficits would be part of the deal, but under later timelines.

White House chief of staff William Daley said Obama is insisting that any package must expand the debt ceiling beyond the next presidential and congressional elections and into 2013 to provide economic certainty. Daley said anything short would be a gimmick and prompt the world to say: "These people just can't get their act together."

White House and congressional leaders talked past each other on the Sunday talks shows as negotiations unfolded in secrecy.

"There will be a two-stage process. It's just not physically possible to do all of this in one step," Boehner said amid White House insistence that the debt limit be extended beyond 2012. "I know the president is worried about his next election. But, my God, shouldn't he be worried about the country?"

Boehner planned to update Republican House members at 4:30 p.m. EDT. Republican leaders called the rank-and-file back to Washington earlier than expected for the new work week and set a mid-afternoon Monday meeting to go over the debt-limit legislation.

With an eye on the financial markets, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner insisted anew that United States would not default.

"It's just unthinkable," Geithner said. "We never do that. It's not going to happen."

The debt deal-making has consumed Washington for weeks and put on display a government that at times risks utter dysfunction.

Even after talks about between Obama and Boehner broke down in spectacular fashion Friday, Geithner said the two men were still negotiating.

He also suggested the ambitious framework the two leaders had discussed, targeting a deficit reduction of $4 trillion, remained under consideration.

"I don't know. It may be pretty hard to put Humpty Dumpty back together again," Boehner said of that grand plan. "But my last offer is still out there. I have never taken my last offer off of the table and they never agreed to my last offer."

That last offer included $800 billion in new tax revenues as part of a broad reform that would lower tax rates. Obama wanted $400 billion more in tax revenue for deficit reduction to help balance out the spending cuts, he said. Or, if not that, a reduction in some of the proposed cuts being discussed to entitlement programs such as Medicare.

The talks halted primarily over that issue and over how to ensure that both parties kept their reform promises in the months ahead.

Staff members of the congressional leaders from both parties were working to come up with an emergency plan.

Boehner said he wanted it a bipartisanship approach but was ready to move ahead if that didn't happen.

Any plan must get through the Democratic-run Senate, where Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has called a short-term debt limit expansion unacceptable.

Obama's role looms, too.

Asked if Obama would veto a plan that did not extend the government's borrowing authority into 2013, Daley said, "Yes."

One key Republican lawmaker scoffed at the administration's opposition to a debt-ceiling plan that doesn't last into 2013.

"I think that's a ridiculous position because that's what he's going to get presented with," said Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla.

Under any scenario, Washington's leaders have run themselves almost out of time.

It will take days to move legislation through Congress. A default could cause catastrophic damage to the standing and the economy of the United States.

Daley said, in fact, the consequences are already taking hold.

"I don't think there's any question there's been enormous damage done to our credit-worthiness around the world," Daley said.

Boehner appeared on "Fox News Sunday." Geithner was on Fox, ABC's "This Week" and CNN's "State of the Union." Daley and Coburn spoke on NBC's "Meet the Press," and Daley also appeared on CBS' "Face the Nation."

Norway gunman fired for 1.5 hours on island

Norway gunman fired for 1.5 hours on island

Unidentified survivers from the shooting at an island youth retreat react outside a hotel where survivors were being reunited with their families in Sundvolden, Norway, Saturday, July 23, 2011. The 32-year-old man suspected in bomb and shooting attacks that killed at least 91 people in Norway bought six tons of fertilizer before the massacres, the supplier said Saturday as police investigated witness accounts of a second shooter. Norway's prime minister and royal family visited grieving relatives of the scores of youth gunned down in a horrific killing spree on an idyllic island retreat.

OSLO, Norway (AP) -- A gunman who opened fire on an island teeming with young people kept shooting for 1.5 hours before surrendering to a SWAT team, which arrived 40 minutes after they were called, police said Saturday.

Survivors of the shooting spree have described hiding and fleeing into the water to escape the gunman, but a police briefing Saturday detailed for the first time how long the terror lasted - and how long victims waited for help.

When the SWAT team arrived, the gunman, who had two firearms, surrendered, said Police Chief Sveinung Sponheim.

"There were problems with transport to Utoya" island, where the youth-wing of Norway's Labor Party was holding a retreat, Sponheim said. "It was difficult to get a hold of boats, but that problem was solved when the SWAT team arrived."

At least 85 people were killed on the island, but police said four or five people were still missing. Divers have been searching the waters around the island.

The attack followed a bombing at a government building in Oslo, where seven people were killed. Police are still digging through rubble there, and Sponheim said body parts remain in the building.

Police have not identified the suspect, but Norwegian national broadcaster NRK say he is 32-year-old Anders Behring Breivik. Authorities have not identified a motive but have said he visited Christian fundamentalist websites and once belonged to the youth-wing of a rightist party.

Police said he is talking to them and has admitted to firing weapons on the island. It was not clear if he had confessed to anything else he is accused of. Police said he retained a lawyer, but the attorney did not want to be named.

"He has had a dialogue with the police the whole time, but he's a very demanding suspect," Sponheim said.

Norway's royal family and prime minister led the nation in mourning, visiting grieving relatives of the scores of youth gunned down.

Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said the twin attacks made Friday peacetime Norway's deadliest day.

"This is beyond comprehension. It's a nightmare. It's a nightmare for those who have been killed, for their mothers and fathers, family and friends," Stoltenberg told reporters earlier Saturday.

Obama ends gays in military ban

Obama ends gays in military ban

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta walks out to greet John Key, Prime Minister of New Zealand, at the Pentagon Thursday, July 21, 2011 in Washington.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama on Friday formally enacted the end to the ban on gays serving openly in the military.

The president joined Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Adm. Mike Mullen, the joint chiefs of staff chairman, in signing a notice and sending it to Congress certifying that military readiness would not be hurt by repealing the 17-year-old "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

That means that 60 days from now the ban will be lifted, fulfilling Obama's 2008 campaign promise to the gay community.

"As commander in chief, I have always been confident that our dedicated men and women in uniform would transition to a new policy in an orderly manner that preserves unit cohesion, recruitment, retention and military effectiveness," Obama said in a statement.

"Today's action follows extensive training of our military personnel and certification by Secretary Panetta and Admiral Mullen that our military is ready for repeal. As of September 20th, service members will no longer be forced to hide who they are in order to serve our country."

Norway ripped by Oslo bomb, youth camp shootings

Norway ripped by Oslo bomb, youth camp shootings

CORRECTS YEAR Debris covers the area outside a building in the centre of Oslo, Friday July 22, 2011, following an explosion that tore open several buildings including the prime minister's office, shattering windows and covering the street with documents

OSLO, Norway (AP) -- A bomb ripped open buildings in the heart of Norway's government Friday, and a man dressed as a police officer opened fire at an island youth camp connected to the ruling party. At least seven people were killed in the blast and nine more in the camp shootings, the peaceful nation's worst violence since World War II.

Oslo police said 9 or 10 people were killed at the camp on Utoya island, where the youth wing of the Labor Party was holding a summer camp for hundreds of youths. Acting Police Chief Sveinung Sponheim says a man was arrested in the shooting, and the suspect had been observed in Oslo before the explosion there.

Sponheim said police were still trying to get an overview of the camp shooting and could not say whether there was more than one shooter.

Aerial images broadcast by Norway's TV2 showed members of a SWAT team dressed in black arriving at the island in boats and running up the dock. Behind them, people stripped down to their underwear swam away from the island toward shore, some using flotation devices.

In Oslo, the capital and the city where the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded, the bombing left a square covered in twisted metal, shattered glass and documents expelled from surrounding buildings.

Most of the windows in the 20-floor high-rise where Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg and his administration work were shattered. Other buildings damaged house government offices and the headquarters of some of Norway's leading newspapers.

Stoltenberg was working at home Friday and was unharmed, according to senior adviser Oivind Ostang.

Oslo University Hospital said 12 people were admitted for treatment following the Utoya shooting, and 11 people were taken there from the explosion in Oslo. The hospital asked people to donate blood.

The attacks formed the deadliest day of terror in Western Europe since the 2005 London bombings, which killed 52 people.

Sponheim wouldn't give any details about the shooting suspect, who he said was dressed in a police uniform when he opened fire into a crowd of youths.

A spokesman for Stoltenberg's Labor Party, Per Gunnar Dahl, said he couldn't confirm that there were fatalities at Utoya, about 60 miles (100 kilometers) northwest of Oslo. The party's youth wing organizes an annual summer camp on the island, and Stoltenberg had been scheduled to speak there Saturday.

"There are at least five people who have been seriously wounded and have been transported to a local hospital," Dahl said. He said the shooting "created a panic situation where people started to swim from the island" to escape.

Police blocked off roads leading to the lake around Utoya. An AP reporter was turned away by police about 5-6 kilometers from the lake, as eight ambulances with sirens blaring entered the area.

In Oslo, police said the explosion was caused by "one or more" bombs, but declined to speculate on who was behind the attack. They later sealed off the nearby offices of broadcaster TV 2 after discovering a suspicious package.

Ian Dutton, who was in a nearby hotel, said the building "shook as if it had been struck by lightning or an earthquake." He looked outside and saw "a wall of debris and smoke."

Dutton, who is from New York, said the scene reminded him of Sept. 11 - people "just covered in rubble" walking through "a fog of debris."

"It wasn't any sort of a panic," he said, "It was really just people in disbelief and shock, especially in a such as safe and open country as Norway, you don't even think something like that is possible."

Public broadcaster NRK showed video of a blackened car lying on its side amid the debris. An AP reporter who was in the office of Norwegian news agency NTB said the building shook from the blast and all employees were evacuated. Down in the street, he saw one person with a bleeding leg being led away from the area.

The explosion occurred at 3:30 p.m. (1330 GMT), as Ole Tommy Pedersen stood at a bus stop 100 meters (yards) away.

"I saw three or four injured people being carried out of the building a few minutes later," Pedersen told AP.

At Utoya, Emilie Bersaas, identified by Sky News television as one of the youths on the island, said she ran inside a school building and hid under a bed when the shooting broke out.

"At one point the shooting was very, very close (to) the building, I think actually it actually hit the building one time, and the people in the next room screamed very loud," she said.

"I laid under the bed for two hours and then the police smashed a window and came in," Bersaas said. "It seems kind of unreal, especially in Norway. This is not something that could happen here, this is something you hear about happening in the U.S."

Another youth at the camp, Niclas Tokerud, stayed in touch with his sister through the attack through text messages.

"He sent me a text saying 'there's been gunshots. I am scared (expletive). But I am hiding and safe. I love you,'" said Nadia Tokerud, a 25-year-old graphic designer in Hokksund, Norway.

As he boarded a boat from the island after the danger had passed he sent one more text: "I'm safe."

The United States, European Union, NATO and the U.K., all quickly condemned the bombing, which Britain's Foreign Secretary William Hague called "horrific" and NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen deemed a "heinous act."

"It's a reminder that the entire international community has a stake in preventing this kind of terror from occurring," President Barack Obama said.

Obama extended his condolences to Norway's people and offered U.S. assistance with the investigation. He said he remembered how warmly Norwegians treated him in Oslo when he accepted the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009.

The U.S. Embassy in Norway warned Americans to avoid downtown Oslo.

The attacks come as Norway grapples with a homegrown terror plot linked to al-Qaida. Two suspects are in jail awaiting charges.

Last week, a Norwegian prosecutor filed terror charges against an Iraqi-born cleric for threatening Norwegian politicians with death if he is deported from the Scandinavian country. The indictment centered on statements that Mullah Krekar - the founder of the Kurdish Islamist group Ansar al-Islam - made to various news media, including American network NBC.

Terrorism has also been a concern in neighboring Denmark since an uproar over cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad six years ago. Danish authorities say they have foiled several terror plots linked to the 2005 newspaper cartoons that triggered protests in Muslim countries. Last month, a Danish appeals court on Wednesday sentenced a Somali man to 10 years in prison for breaking into the home of the cartoonist.

Europe has been the target of numerous terror plots by Islamist militants. The deadliest was the 2004 Madrid train bombings, when shrapnel-filled bombs exploded, killing 191 people and wounding about 1,800. A year later, suicide bombers killed 52 rush-hour commuters in London aboard three subway trains and a bus. And in 2006, U.S. and British intelligence officials thwarted one of the largest plots yet - a plan to explode nearly a dozen trans-Atlantic airliners.

In October, the U.S. State Department advised American citizens living or traveling in Europe to take more precautions following reports that terrorists may be plotting attacks on a European city. Some countries went on heightened alert after the May 2 killing of Osama bin Laden.

Boehner: House will compromise on debt limit

Boehner: House will compromise on debt limit

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio is followed by reporters after a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, July 21, 2011.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- House Speaker John Boehner predicted Thursday that a majority of House Republicans will end up supporting some kind of compromise to avoid a government default. Democrats insisted that higher tax revenue be part of a deal.

White House budget chief Jacob Lew told reporters at the Capitol that "I'm unaware of a deal" between President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans and he repeated that "we've made clear revenues have to be included."

All sides pushed against media reports that Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, were near an agreement on a grand bargain trading $3 trillion or so in spending cuts and a promise of $1 trillion in tax revenues through a later overhaul of the tax code as part of a deal to extend the government's borrowing authority.

"We're not close to a deal," White House spokesman Jay Carney said.

"While we are keeping the lines of communication open, there is no `deal' and no progress to report," Boehner spokesman Michael Steel said.

What seems clear is that the White House and Boehner continue to negotiate in hopes of a large deficit-cutting package as an Aug. 2 deadline looms on extending the debt limit.

""There has been a meeting of the minds ... to try and get a grand bargain, a big deal," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md. "I think both sides have remained focused on that."

"I only know what you know about the agreement - the potential agreement," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said. "What I have to say is this: The president always talked about balance. That there had to be some fairness in this. That this can't be all cuts. There has to be a balance. There has to be some revenue."

Earlier, Reid called up for Senate consideration a House-passed "cut, cap, and balance" measure that would increase the debt limit by $2.4 trillion, but which would condition the increase on immediate spending cuts and a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. But he said it "doesn't have one chance in a million of passing the Senate."

But Reid also announced that he would hold a vote on Friday to kill the measure, which he called "about as weak and senseless as anything that has ever come on this Senate floor and I am not going to waste the Senate's time day after day."

At a news conference, Boehner told reporters, "Frankly, I think it would be irresponsible on behalf of the Congress and the president not to be looking at backup strategies for how to solve this problem."

"At the end of the day, we have a responsibility to act," the Ohio Republican said.

Asked whether GOP lawmakers supporting the House's "cut, cap and balance" debt limit measure would be unwilling to ultimately compromise, Boehner said, "I'm sure we've got some members who believe that, but I do not believe that would be anywhere close to the majority."

Boehner's talk of possible accommodation in the protracted political stalemate over federal budget policy came as the Senate took up the tea party-backed House legislation Thursday.

Democrats argue that the measure would impose untenable spending restraints and set spending levels, as a percentage of the overall economy, on par with the mid-1960s - before the advent of Medicare and automatic Social Security cost-of-living adjustments.

The development Thursday reflected the reality that there's more talk than progress as official Washington wrangles daily over finding a way out of a debt dilemma that has the government sliding inexorably toward a first-ever default on its financial obligations.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Thursday the legislation now before his chamber would be an opportunity for lawmakers to "go on record in support of balancing our books or against it." He urged Democrats to join GOP senators in backing it.

Democrats are expected to kill the measure - which they say would demand debilitating cuts to Medicare - in a vote on Saturday if not before.

Meanwhile, momentum on a separate bipartisan budget plan by the Senate's "Gang of Six" seemed to ebb as critics warned the measure contains larger tax increases than advertised and it became plain that the measure comes too late and is too controversial to advance quickly - particularly as a part of a debt limit package that already would be teetering on a knife's edge.

Absent a breakthrough between Obama and Republicans, there is a hotly contested backup plan by McConnell that would give Obama broad new powers to obtain increases in the government's borrowing unless blocked by veto-proof two-thirds margins in both the House and Senate.

Many conservative Republicans are in an uproar over the McConnell plan, and more than 70 House members signed a letter circulated by members of the conservative Republican Study Committee calling on Boehner to come out in public opposition to the McConnell-Reid plan..

In a shift, said Wednesday that Obama would back a short-term deal to prevent a disastrous financial default on Aug. 2 but only if a larger and still elusive deficit-cutting agreement was essentially in place.

Officially, the president continued to push for a big compromise that would cut the nation's budget deficit and extend the government's tapped-out borrowing power above the current $14.3 trillion cap. Obama had threatened to veto any stopgap expansion of the nation's debt limit, at one point last week even challenging House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., not to call his bluff about it.

Carney said if a divided Congress and the White House can agree on a significant deal, Obama would accept a "very short-term extension" of the debt limit to let bigger legislation work its way through Congress.

Obama also is open to the McConnell plan, but it seems barely aloft due to fervent tea party opposition in the House. The hope appears to be that such an option will look a lot better to the House in a week or so, given the lack of other ideas.

The Gang of Six plan has come under assault from critics like House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who say the plan would increase taxes by $2 trillion over the next 10 years instead of the $1 trillion-plus claimed by proponents like Conrad - a development likely to stunt momentum among Republicans.

The revenue increase is larger than advertised because the $1.2 trillion in new taxes comes on top of an underlying assumption used by Obama's deficit commission - and incorporated by the Senate group in its plan - that the Bush-era income tax brackets for family income exceeding $250,000 would revert to the higher, Clinton administration levels. The deficit panel's assumption was made before Obama buckled in December and signed a full extension of the Bush tax cuts.

If debt deal near, Obama would OK stopgap measure

If debt deal near, Obama would OK stopgap measure

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., walks to the Senate floor on Capitol Hill in Washington on Wednesday, July 20, 2011.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Running out of time, President Barack Obama softened his stand and signaled Wednesday he would back a short-term deal to prevent a disastrous financial default on Aug. 2, but only if a larger and still elusive deficit-cutting agreement was essentially in place. He called lawmakers to the White House in a scramble to find enough votes from both Republicans and his own party.

The president, pushing for a big compromise that would cut the nation's budget deficit and extend the government's tapped-out borrowing power, had threatened to veto any stopgap expansion of the nation's debt limit. He even challenged House Majority Leader Eric Cantor not to call his bluff about it in one confrontational moment last week.

Obama's now-calibrated position, offered by spokesman Jay Carney, reflected the reality: that leaders are nearly out of time to head off unprecedented trouble. Carney said if a divided Congress and the White House can agree on a significant deal, Obama would accept a "very short-term extension" of the debt limit to let bigger legislation work its way through Congress.

Even a few days matters, given the stakes. The government will exhaust its ability to borrow money and pay its bills come Aug. 2, an outcome that could sink the country back into recession, halt Social Security checks and other payments, send interest rates higher and erode the creditworthiness of the richest nation on earth.

At the White House, Obama met privately with the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate, and then separately with House Speaker John Boehner and Cantor. All signs pointed to a legislative battle that would play out until the last minute.

The latest talks centered on a single but complex question: What will it take to muster enough votes from both parties to muscle legislation through the House and Senate and raise the national debt limit by the deadline. Congressional leaders say they want to prevent default, but they are far from agreed on how.

The divided-by-party nature of Obama's negotiations underscored his need to get a bottom line from Democrats in both chambers and the leaders of the Republican-run House.

His challenge with fellow Democrats is to persuade them to accept changes to the popular entitlement programs of Medicare and Social Security. With Republicans, Obama is slamming into opposition from conservatives who refuse to consider tax increases. Obama wants a mixed approach of higher taxes on the wealthy and spending cuts that share the pain.

"There is still time to do something significant," Carney said, urging compromise.

Realistically, though, the deadline for agreement is this week, not next week, given the time needed to craft, debate, pass and work out possible differences in legislation.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said Tuesday that the head of the Congressional Budget Office has told him it could take the scorekeeping agency two weeks to come up with an official cost estimate for even a relatively modest package of spending cuts.

Then there are the problems of moving the debt limit increase through the Senate, where the rules allow any single member to force delays.

Parliamentary experts say that if the Senate takes up the debt limit measure this Saturday, it could take more than a week, until Monday, Aug. 1, to pass the measure through the Senate, give the House time to consider it and make changes and then gain Senate approval one more time.

The Obama administration and Congress are also working on a backup plan to increase the debt limit if no big plan can be reached. It would allow Obama to raise the ceiling on his own unless overridden by Congress. Yet many House Republicans loathe that idea and have pledged to vote against it, raising doubts about how tenable even the fallback choice is.

That plan is the result of work by the Democratic and Republican leaders of the Senate, Reid of Nevada and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

Obama is trying to seize on momentum from a proposal from a bipartisan "Gang of Six" senators that would cut the deficit by almost $4 trillion but lacks many specifics.

Obama met for less than an hour with Reid; Dick Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate and a member of the Gang of Six; House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, the No. 2 Democrat in the House.

A House Democratic aide familiar with the meeting said House Democrats stand with Obama on his push for a big bargain but without hurting seniors through cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

Obama's meeting with Boehner and Cantor ran roughly 90 minutes.

Keeping details tight as time grows sensitive, the White House provided no press coverage of either meeting.

The plan by the Gang of Six is probably far too complicated and contentious to win passage before the Aug. 2 deadline. But the plan's authors hope it could serve as a template for a "grand bargain" later in the year that could erase perhaps $4 trillion from the deficit over the coming decade.

Even among Democrats, Rep. Chris Van Hollen, senior Democrat on the House Budget Committee, said lawmakers had too few details about the Gang of Six plan.

Pelosi, the top Democrat in the House, reacted positively Wednesday to the new plan, saying it "has some good principles in it."

However, Republican Rep. Howard "Buck" McKeon of California, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, blasted the plan in a missive to his panel members, saying it would cut the Pentagon much too deeply and would unfairly curb military health and retirement benefits.

In the House, majority Republicans won a 234-190 vote Tuesday on a "cut, cap and balance" plan conditioning any increase in the government's borrowing authority on congressional passage of a balanced budget constitutional amendment and a fresh wave of spending cuts. That reflected the strength of tea party forces elected in last year's midterm election. GOP conservatives reveled in their victory, but it was temporary. That plan faces a White House veto threat and is a dead letter in the Senate anyway.

The Gang of Six plan, meanwhile, promises almost $4 trillion in deficit cuts, including an immediate 10-year, $500 billion down payment that would come as Congress sets caps on the agency budgets it passes each year. It also requires an additional $500 billion in cost curbs on federal health care programs, cuts to federal employee pensions, curbs in the growth of military health care and retirement costs and modest cuts to farm subsidies.

Murdoch rejects blame for hack scandal at hearing

Murdoch rejects blame for hack scandal at hearing

Rupert Murdoch, gives evidence to the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee on the News of the World phone-hacking scandal in this image taken from TV in Portcullis House in central London Tuesday July 19 2011.

LONDON (AP) -- Summoned by lawmakers to answer for a phone hacking and bribery scandal at one of his tabloids, Rupert Murdoch said he was humbled and ashamed Tuesday but accepted no responsibility for wrongdoing as a widening investigation threatened to ensnare Britain's prime minister.

In a three-hour grilling, the 80-year-old media tycoon insisted he was at fault only for trusting the wrong people at the now-defunct News of the World, and noted that the paper made up a tiny portion of his vast media empire.

The scandal has rocked Murdoch's News Corp. and embroiled Britain's top police, many journalists and politicians. Prime Minister David Cameron cut short his Africa trip to appear before a special parliamentary question session on Wednesday.

Murdoch appeared confused and flustered in the beginning of Tuesday's parliamentary hearing, turning frequently to his son James for answers. But he soon regained his trademark cool.

He said he had known nothing of allegations that staff at the News of the World tabloid hacked into cell phones and bribed police to get information on celebrities, politicians and crime victims, and that he never would have approved such "horrible invasions" of privacy.

In the face of lawmakers' suggestions that his organization encouraged such behavior, he was unflappable - even after a protester rushed at him in the middle of the hearing.

He stayed seated when the man tried to throw a foam pie at him. A News Corp. attorney partially blocked the attack and Murdoch's 42-year-old wife slapped the prankster. After the protester was arrested, the billionaire simply shed his splattered suit jacket and continued answering questions.

The scandal has captivated audiences from America to Murdoch's native Australia, and there's more to come - only a fraction of the nearly 4,000 people whose information was hacked are known and the police investigation appears to be widening. Murdoch has already shut the News of the World, given up on buying a major British satellite television company and accepted the resignations of two top executives because of the scandal.

He said he had no plans to resign but expressed contrition on behalf of News Corp.'s British newspaper division, News International.

"This is the most humble day of my career," said Murdoch, a man once so politically powerful in Britain that former Prime Minister Tony Blair flew halfway around the world to secure his support as he launched the Labour Party's bid for power in 1995.

The scandal began as a blip in 2005, when the News of the World published a story about Prince William suffering a knee injury. Royal officials became suspicious about the closely held data and alerted police. An inquiry led to one of the paper's reporters and a private investigator being jailed for intercepting communications.

The Guardian newspaper then found out that Murdoch's papers had paid out more than $1.6 million (1 million pounds) to settle lawsuits involving allegations of eavesdropping on phone messages. The scandal became a crisis for News International this month with the revelation that the News of the World had hacked into the phone of a 13-year-old murder victim, Milly Dowler, in hopes of getting material for news stories.

Occasionally punctuating remarks by slapping his hands down on the desk, Murdoch said he was "shocked, appalled and ashamed" at the hacking of Dowler's phone but he rejected that criminality had been endemic at the tabloid. He also said he had seen no evidence that victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack were hacked - an allegation the FBI is looking into.

Murdoch said he had not been informed that his company had paid out big sums - 700,000 pounds ($1.1 million) in one case - to settle lawsuits by phone hacking victims.

Murdoch noted that News of the World represented less than 1 percent of his global media empire, which also includes the Fox TV network, 20th Century Fox film studio, The Wall Street Journal, the New York Post and three major British newspapers. He said he spoke to the News of the World's editor only around once a month.

Blame, he said, rested with "the people I trusted ... and then, maybe, the people they trusted."

News International CEO Rebekah Brooks and Wall Street Journal publisher Les Hinton, former executive chairman of News International, have resigned, though Murdoch said he did not blame either of them for the scandal. Brooks and Cameron's former communications chief, Andy Coulson - a former editor at News of the World - are among several people who have been arrested in the scandal, though no one has been charged with a crime.

James Murdoch, 38, apologized for the scandal, telling British lawmakers that "these actions do not live up to the standards our company aspires to."

The younger Murdoch said the company acted as swiftly and transparently as possible. Rupert Murdoch acknowledged, however, that he did not investigate after Brooks, former editor of the News of the World, told parliament years ago that the paper had paid police officers for information.

The value of News Corp. added around $2 billion while the Murdochs were being grilled, trading 5.3 percent higher at $15.74. The stock has taken a battering over the past couple of weeks, shedding around 17 percent of its value, or around $8 billion.

Brooks testified after the Murdochs. All three agreed to provide evidence only after they were summoned.

Brooks described allegations of voicemail intercepts of crime victims as "pretty horrific and abhorrent." She said had been told by News of the World employees that allegations of phone hacking by News of the World journalists were untrue, and that she realized the gravity of the situation only when she saw documents lodged in a civil damages case by actress Sienna Miller last year.

Brooks also said she had never knowingly sanctioned a payoff to a police officer.

Asked whether she had been lied to by senior employees at the newspaper, Brooks said she could not answer because of the criminal investigation.

Politicians also pushed Tuesday for details about the Murdochs' ties to Prime Minister David Cameron and other members of the British political establishment.

Cameron, who is expected to return from Africa late Tuesday, has been criticized for employing Coulson as his communications chief when he was aware of phone hacking allegations.

Lawmakers want to know why Cameron insisted on hiring Coulson despite warnings, how much the prime minister knew about the phone hacking investigation, whether Coulson had any role in persuading the police to initially drop the hacking investigation, and how many times Cameron met with Murdoch or top associates at News International.

Before the Murdochs' testimony, lawmakers questioned London police about reports that officers took bribes from journalists to provide inside information for scoops, and to ask why the force decided to shut down an earlier phone hacking probe after charging only two people.

Detectives reopened the case earlier this year and are looking at a potential 3,700 victims. Police have only notified some 200 of the people.

The erupting scandal has revealed a cozy relationship between British police and the press. Paul Stephenson, who resigned as London's police commissioner Sunday, told lawmakers Tuesday that 10 of the Metropolitan Police's 45 press officers used to work for News International.

Stephenson denied wrongdoing, or knowing the News of the World was engaged in phone hacking, but acknowledged that he was embarrassed that the force had hired Neil Wallis, an arrested former executive of the paper, as a PR consultant. Stephenson said he stepped down because allegations about his contacts with News International were a distraction to the force.

He was followed out the door by assistant commissioner John Yates, who also testified Tuesday. Yates has denied wrongdoing and said that, with the benefit of hindsight, he would have reopened an inquiry into electronic eavesdropping of voicemail messages.

Rupert Murdoch is eager to stop the crisis from spreading to the United States.

In New York, News Corp. appointed commercial lawyer Anthony Grabiner to run its Management and Standards Committee, which will deal with the scandal.

News Corp. board member Thomas Perkins told The Associated Press that Murdoch has the full support of the company's board of directors, and it was not considering elevating Chief Operating Officer Chase Carey to replace Murdoch as CEO of News Corp.

Obama threatens veto of House GOP spending cuts

Obama threatens veto of House GOP spending cuts

House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, right, speaks during a news conference with House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., left, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, July 15, 2011.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Courting confrontation and compromise alike, House Republicans shrugged off President Barack Obama's threat to veto legislation to cut federal spending by trillions of dollars on Monday while simultaneously negotiating with him over more modest steps to avert a potential government default.

The Republican bill demands deep spending reductions and congressional approval of a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution in exchange for raising the nation's debt limit. But Obama will veto it if it reaches his desk, the White House said, asserting the legislation would "lead to severe cuts in Medicare and Social Security" and impose unrealistic limits on education spending.

In response, GOP lawmakers said they would go ahead with plans to pass the bill on Tuesday. "It's disappointing the White House would reject this commonsense plan to rein in the debt and deficits that are hurting job creation in America," Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio said.

By contrast, neither the administration nor congressional officials provided substantive details on an unannounced meeting that Obama held Sunday with the two top House Republican leaders, Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Virginia.

Obama said late Monday the two sides were "making progress."

Several Republicans said privately the decision to vote on veto-threatened legislation is paradoxically designed to clear the way for a compromise. They said conservatives would have a chance to push their deep spending cuts through the House, and then see the measure quickly die either in the Democratic-controlled Senate or by veto.

Barring action by Congress to raise the $14.3 trillion debt limit, the Treasury will be unable to pay all the government's bills that come due beginning on Aug. 3, two weeks from Wednesday. Administration officials, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and others say the result could be a default that inflicts serious harm on the economy, which is still struggling to recover from the worst recession in decades.

In a gesture underscoring the significance of the issue, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., announced the Senate will meet each day until it is resolved, including on weekends.

The two-pronged approach pursued by the House GOP follows the collapse of a weeks-long effort to negotiate a sweeping bipartisan plan to cut into future deficits. The endeavor foundered when Obama demanded that tax increases on the wealthy and selected corporations be included alongside cuts in benefit programs, and Republicans refused.

The failure of that effort also reflects the outsized influence exerted by 87 first-term Republicans, many of them elected last fall with tea party backing.

As late as last Thursday, Republican leaders held a news conference to tout plans to vote this week on a proposed balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.

But the same senior Republicans emerged from a closed-door meeting of the rank and file on Friday to say the House would instead vote on an alternative - dubbed by its advocates as "Cut, Cap and Balance." No date has been set for a vote on the constitutional amendment itself.

Officials said the change in course had been requested by members of the Republican Study Committee, whose members are among the most conservative in Congress.

Supporters of the measure say it would cut $111 billion from government spending in the budget year that begins on Oct 1, and $6 trillion more over the coming decade through a requirement that the budget shrink relative to the overall size of the economy.

Additionally, it would require both houses of Congress to approve a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution as a condition for an increase in the debt limit.

Both Boehner and Cantor reacted relatively mildly to the White House veto threat.

"As President Obama has not put forth a plan that can garner 218 votes in the House, I'd caution him against so hastily dismissing `Cut, Cap and Balance,'" said Cantor.

Other Republicans, by contrast, took a harder line.

"I find it incredibly ironic that President Obama is one of the few Americans who think we don't need a constitutional amendment `to do our jobs.'" Said Rep. Jeb Hensarling of Texas, a member of the leadership.

"The point of cutting up the credit cards in order to raise the debt ceiling isn't to meet his tax-and-spend demands; it's to force him to stop spending money we don't have."

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky made a strong statement of support for the measure.

"Not only is this legislation just the kind of thing Washington needs right now, it may be the only option we have if you want to see the debt limit raised at all," he said.

"I strongly urge my Democratic friends to join us in supporting it."

Despite his warning, McConnell and Reid have been deeply involved in writing a fallback measure that is viewed in both houses as promising.

It would allow the president to raise the debt limit by $2.4 trillion in three installments over the next year without a prior vote by lawmakers. Instead, a panel of House and Senate members would be created to recommend cuts in benefit programs, with their work guaranteed a yes-or-no vote in the House or Senate.

Recreating the divide that plagued the earlier negotiations, Democrats want the panel to have the power to recommend higher taxes.

Neither Reid nor McConnell has publicly disclosed the details of the measure, and neither is expected to do so as long as the legislation in the House is pending.

One conservative deficit hawk, Sen. Tom Coburn, unveiled his own proposal to bring federal deficits under control. The Oklahoma Republican recommended $9 trillion in cuts over a decade, including $1 trillion in higher taxes.