President Obama complimented the liberal Huffington Post reporter Sam Stein on his observation that a clean government funding bill would allegedly still not spend enough money to help the struggling economy Tuesday in the White House press conference:
SAM STEIN: Thank you, Mr. President. With Speaker Boehner so far unwilling to hold a vote on a clean CR, what assurances can you give to those affected by a shutdown who are concerned about an even longer impasse? And how worried are you personally that your preferred solution to this clean CR and sequestration levels may do harm to the nation's economy and your second-term agenda?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, I mean, Sam, you're making an important point, which is what we're asking of the Republicans right now is to keep the government open at funding levels that Democrats think are very harmful to the economy and inadequate to make sure that the economy is growing faster, more people are put back to work and the middle glass is growing. We're willing to pass at least a short-term budget that opens up the government at current funding levels. It doesn't even address the harm that's been done because of sequestration.
Now, the Democrats have a budget that would eliminate sequestration, this meat cleaver approach to deficit reduction, and make sure that we're adequately funding basic medical research and Head Start programs and VA programs and a whole range of things that have been really hard-hit this year. But we recognize that there are going to have be some compromises between the Democratic position and the Republican position. And in the meantime, we shouldn't hurt the economy even worse by shutting down the government.
So, let me just give you an example, very specific. Because of sequestration, because of the meat cleaver cuts that have been taking place over the course of this year, thousands of families have lost Head Start slots for their children.
And so you've had parents all across the country who've been scrambling trying to figure out, how can I find some decent, quality child care for my kids?
Now, the government shutdown means several thousand more are going to be losing their slots. If we vote today or tomorrow or the next day in the House of Representatives to go ahead and reopen the government, at least those additional several thousand people will be spared the difficulties of trying to scramble and figure out where your kid's going to be when you're trying to go to work.
But it doesn't solve the broader problems. And if we were going to have real negotiations, the Democrats would say, let's solve the bigger problem. What about all those thousands who've been hurt by sequester? The Democrats aren't making that demand right now. We understand there's going to have to be some give and take. What we are saying is don't hurt more people while we're trying to resolve these differences. Let's just at least make sure that we keep the lights on while we're having these conversations.
Democrats have recently began to claim Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) already "compromised" with Speaker of the House John Boehner (R., Ohio) when he agreed to vote for a continuing resolution at sequestration levels.
However, despite the litany of issues with Obamacare during its first week in debut, President Obama and the Democrats in Congress have still refused to negotiate with the GOP on any changes to the embattled healthcare law.