The Republicans currently control Congress and are offering their blueprint of a budget this week, with a pledge to balance the budget for the country within the next decade, while reining in big programs such as Medicare and food stamps.
More pressing for most Republicans however is pulling back on automatic budget cuts that will slam the U.S. military. The chairmen of the Senate and House Budget panels will release budget plans during the week, with the House scheduled for Tuesday and the Senate for Wednesday.
The measure, which is non-binding, is called a budget resolution and sets up broad parameters on spending and taxes; requires legislation that is follow up later the same year to implement its goals of a balanced budget, and it is unlikely Republicans will take the task on as long as the Oval Office is occupied by President Obama.
Instead, the blueprints will propose big spending cuts in programs such as food stamps, healthcare subsidies, Medicare and Medicaid for the elderly and poor to balance the budget.
These cuts, if implemented later this year, would likely slash $5 trillion from spending over the upcoming decade from those budgets already on track to spend close to $50 trillion over the same timeframe.
The defense hawks the Republicans are unable to use the arcane budget process of Congress to repeal the automatic cuts in the Pentagon that will cut $54 billion from the core programs at the Pentagon based on the limits set under a 2011 hard fought budget deal.
They cannot match the proposal of adding $38 billion by Obama to the budget for next year without exposing the complete budget to a Democratic parliamentary challenge.
That has defense and deficit hawks such as John McCain the Chairman of the Armed Services Committee in the Senate fuming.
