Senate Dems view budget proposal a priority

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By Kara Rowland

Senate Democrats emerged from a meeting Wednesday saying President Barack Obama understands his $3.6 billion budget proposal will change as it makes its way through Congress but downplayed any dissension within the caucus over the president's ambitious spending and tax proposals.

"He didn't make a pitch for his plan, he made a pitch for his priorities," said Sen. Ben Nelson, Nebraska Democrat, on his way out of the lunch meeting. "That's the process. He kicks off, we receive, we run the ball, we call the plays and he likes some, he doesn't like some."

Mr. Obama's trip to the Capitol was viewed largely as a sales pitch after several of his former colleagues raised concerns over the size and scope of his agenda, including contentious proposals, such as cap-and-trade and cutting farm subsidies. The meeting came on the heels of a prime-time press conference Tuesday night touting the budget to voters.

Mr. Nelson, a key moderate, said neither he nor his Democratic colleagues discussed those concerns Wednesday, adding that Mr. Obama has "recognized" the legislative process and shied away from negotiating details of his budget. Instead, he made the case for general priorities such as education, energy and health care.

"The president hasn't tried to manage the Senate or Congress and he shouldn't. I think he realizes this is a relationship that has to be friendly and mutually accessible to one another, and that's what he's doing," Mr. Nelson said.

Mr. Obama, the first to exit the meeting, told reporters it "went great."

Budget Committee Chairman Sen. Kent Conrad, who issued his version of Mr. Obama's budget Wednesday, said the president understood that changes to his proposal needed to be made after congressional auditors said it underestimates the deficit increase by $2.3 trillion. As for Mr. Obama's cap-and-trade and health care plans, the North Dakota Democrat stressed that he neither included nor excluded them.

"What we did is leave open to the committees of jurisidction maximum flexibility to make these judgments so they can write climate change legislation if it's paid for," he said. "So we have not prejudged a legislative outcome."

House Democrats' budget trims the president's 2010 budget request by about $100 billion and does instruct Congress to overhaul health care and spend on education, but does not include language that would make it easier to pass the president's preferred carbon cap-and-trade approach to global warming.

They also eliminated money for any future financial bailout, and cut Mr. Obama's tax cut proposals.

Earlier Wednesday, the White House said Mr. Conrad's plan and the House plan are "98 percent the same" as Mr. Obama's proposal despite several differences such as rejecting his long-term middle class tax cut.

"Yes, there are some differences, but I think the big story is how similar these two things are, rather than the small adjustments," Budget Director Peter R. Orszag said in a conference call with reporters to evaluate the budget.

Likewise, Mr. Conrad said, "[President Obama] asked the caucus what he asked me: 'Preserve my priorities.' "

Senate Democrats' budget makes many of the same changes. Both budget committees are meeting Wednesday to debate the blueprints.

Oddly, the White House's claims of success got agreement from Republicans, who were eager to tie their congressional Democratic colleagues to Mr. Obama's budget, which they see as an unpopular flood of spending.

"With this budget, the President and the Democratic Majority are attempting - very quickly, and rather openly - nothing less than the third and final great wave of government expansion, building on the New Deal and the Great Society," said Rep. Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, the top Republican on the House Budget Committee.

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