Thursday, April 7, 2011

Latest White House huddle fails to yield budget deal; shutdown nears

   increasing chances for a partial government shutdown to begin  

Washington (CNN) -- A fourth White House meeting in 48 hours between President Barack Obama and congressional leaders failed to reach agreement Thursday night on a spending plan for the rest of the current fiscal year, increasing chances for a partial government shutdown to begin just over 24 hours later.
The talks involving Obama, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, as well as Vice President Joe Biden, ended less than an hour after starting.
"We made some progress today," Obama told reporters in brief remarks, saying differences had been narrowed and staff members would work through the night to try to reach agreement on the few remaining "difficult issues." He provided no details.
"I'm not prepared to express wild optimism," Obama said. "I think we are further along today than we were yesterday."
Obama added that he told Reid and Boehner he wanted an answer Friday morning on whether a deal would get reached, and the White House announced that Obama's planned trip on Friday to Indiana to promote clean energy had been called off.
In their own joint statement, Reid and Boehner also said they had narrowed the issues but lacked an agreement. They pledged to work through the night to resolve the remaining differences, but provided no details............http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/04/07/congress.budget/index.html?hpt=T1

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