There were two budget votes yesterday in the Senate, but the Washington Post would rather you only focus on the one that got 40 more votes than Obama's.
Rep. Paul Ryan's (R-Wis.) plan was rejected by 57 senators, including 5 Republicans. But President Obama's budget blueprint was rejected by 97 senators and supported by zero.
Washington Post reporters covering the development waited until the 17th paragraph in their 22-paragraph May 26 front page story to note the outcome of Obama budget vote:
Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) then called up Obama’s initial 2012 budget proposal for consideration. Both parties had criticized the plan, saying it would offer only a minor reduction in the national debt. The president has since put forward a new blueprint that would shave $4 trillion from projected deficits over 12 years. With Obama himself abandoning his initial budget proposal, not a single senator voted for it.
As Alexander Bolton of The Hill noted yesterday:
The president’s budget called for ending tax cuts for the wealthy and a three-year domestic spending freeze, saving an estimated $1.1 trillion over 10 years. Democratic senators at the time called it “an important step forward”, “a good start” and a “credible blueprint.”
No Democratic senator was willing to support it, however, after Obama discussed a more ambitious plan at George Washington University to save $4 trillion over 12 years. Republicans criticized his speech for lacking detail.
So Democrats have no budget blueprint to work off of for fiscal year 2012, just a speech President Obama made that laid out some broad policy goals but has no specifics.
Yet to the Washington Post, the real story as how the "GOP sticks to Medicare proposal" even though "Unease remains after House defeat in N.Y."
Post reporters Paul Kane, Amy Goldstein and Peter Wallsten did note in paragraph 10 that "The Democrats... are continuing to bash Ryan's approach and are not proposing major, new ideas of their own."
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