Warning: America’s unemployment will rise if budget cuts go into effect.
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That was the straight-forward message that President Barack Obama gave to Republicans in Congress who oppose any new revenue as a means to avoid budget cuts.
On Tuesday, the President spoke to Congress with an audience of firefighters, police officers and other emergency responders behind him to represent the people that may “lose their jobs” if the forced budget cuts happen on March 1.
President Obama warned of diminished emergency services, longer airport security lines and other problems if Congress fails to reach agreement on avoiding the harshest impacts of automatic, across-the-board spending cuts.
The cuts, known to politicians as the sequestration, won’t help the economy grow or achieve jobs.
“Air traffic controllers and airport security will see cutbacks, which means more delays at airports across the country,” Obama continued. “Thousands of teachers and educators will be laid off. Tens of thousands of parents will have to scramble to find child care for their kids. Hundreds of thousands of Americans will lose access to primary care and preventive care like flu vaccinations and cancer screenings.”
“If Congress allows this meat-cleaver approach to take place, it will jeopardize our military readiness, it will eviscerate job-creating investments in education and energy and medical research, it won’t consider whether we’re cutting some bloated program that has outlived its usefulness or a vital service that Americans depend on every single day,” Obama said. “It doesn’t make those distinctions.”
The President also pointed out that Republican ideas so far for avoiding the cuts ask nothing from the wealthy or big corporations.
“The American people have worked too hard, for too long, rebuilding from one crisis to see their elected officials cause another.”
Now, it’s up to Congress to make sure we don’t fall off of another metaphorical cliff of some sort. Fingers crossed.
SOURCE: CNN
