Obama: Solution to Avoid Default Must Be Bipartisan

Speeches long on politics, short on solutions

(NEWSER) - President Obama and John Boehner gave dueling speeches last night, and the news was not good. Here's what the pundits are taking away from it all:

• If people—or markets—were looking for reassurance, “they were out of luck,” observes Politico . Instead, Obama and Boehner “treated viewers to the unsettling spectacle of two leaders talking past, not to, each other,” with Obama even issuing a “stunning” plea for people to call their representatives.

But today's the absolute last one—right?

(NEWSER) - Today is, supposedly, the absolute last day for debt limit legislation to be introduced in the House if the US wants to avoid defaulting on Aug. 2. As we wait to see if lawmakers make the deadline, Uri Friedman, writing in in the Atlantic Wire, looks at all the deadlines they've missed so far:

1. May 16: Timothy Geithner originally named this as the date the US would risk default, but when it passed without Congress raising the debt ceiling, the Treasury shuffled some clamshells to postpone the default date to Aug. 2—at which point "the borrowing authority of the United States will be exhausted."
2. June 31: On June 1, John Boehner said that a deal must be made in the next month in order to avoid "rattling investors."

Boehner believes proposal must hit House today

(NEWSER) - We may very well be at zero hour: John Boehner has privately told Republicans that in order to get a debt ceiling measure signed by President Obama by the Aug. 2 deadline, it must be introduced in the House today. But despite the increasing likeliness of a US default, Politico reports that hope for a bipartisan deal has disintegrated. After meeting with the president and Nancy Pelosi last night, Harry Reid accused Boehner of taking a "my-way-or-the-highway approach," and reiterated the fact that his two-part plan —or any short-term plan—is "a non-starter in the Senate and with the president." Politico also notes that Obama, after three weeks of being highly visible, was on the sidelines during this weekend's developments, a potentially risky move this late in the game. More»

President pleads for compromise in primetime address

(AP) - President Obama took to the airwaves tonight, charging that the only ones standing in the way of a balanced compromise to the nation's debt crisis are those Republicans in Congress who are insisting only on spending cuts. "The American people may have voted for divided government, but they didn't vote for a dysfunctional government," the president said in a hastily arranged primetime speech. He appealed to the public to contact lawmakers and demand "a balanced approach" to reducing federal deficits, calling a failure to reach compromise a "reckless and irresponsible" outcome. More»

Boehner will offer rebuttal after

(NEWSER) - President Obama will address the nation at 9pm tonight, in the wake of dueling debt ceiling plans offered this afternoon by House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Boehner, whose proposal is coming under fire from conservatives, will give a short rebuttal afterward. All networks will carry both addresses, reports the AP. More»