Obama invites lawmakers to discuss shutdown, debt limit amid little sign of compromise . . . . . . . . . The White House on Wednesday announced a series of meetings with lawmakers from both parties to resolve ongoing fiscal stalemate and focus on the government shutdown, looming debt crisis as the U.S. enters the final week before it runs out of borrowing authority with a flurry of activity. President Obama is setting up private meetings at the White House in an effort to make progress with lawmakers in the deadlocked budget negotiations over the government shutdown. Lawmakers are trying to break the impasse that has brought the country into a tenth day of partial government shutdown and close to the $16.7 trillion debt limit impasse due by Oct. 17. If the U.S. doesn’t raise the debt limit by Oct. 17, the government starts missing scheduled payments, including benefits, salaries and interest, between Oct. 22 and Oct. 31. Without the debt ceiling increase the government faces a default that Obama says will create an "economic shutdown." Obama and the House Democrats meeting Wednesday showed the president and congressional Democrats continue to advocate for a stopgap funding bill to reopen government and a debt ceiling increase with no strings attached. President Obama plans to meet with House Republicans on Thursday, but the two sides are already clashing over the guest list. Where Boehner rejected Obama`s invitation for all 232 House Republicans, instead selecting a team of 18 -member delegation made up of elected leaders and committee chairmen. The president will also meet with Senate Democrats on Thursday and Senate Republicans later in the week. The meetings come as Republicans are accusing Obama of not negotiating with them over the budget and debt-ceiling impasse. - Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew will testify before the Senate Finance Committee at 8 a.m. - House Republicans will meet at 10 a.m. in the Capitol to discuss their strategy. - All Senate Democrats will meet with Obama at 1:45 p.m. in the White House. - At 4:35 p.m., 18 House Republican leaders and committee chairmen will meet with Obama. Finally, The House and Senate are scheduled to be in session Saturday, a sign that lawmakers do not anticipate a breakthrough before the weekend. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has scheduled a key vote for Saturday to allow the Senate to debate a bill to suspend the debt ceiling through 2014. Reid must gain support from at least six Republicans. Yields on benchmark 10-year notes tumbled again Thursday amid rising investor concern about the prospect of a government-debt default, sending the yield 2.5 percentage points lower to 2.688 for the third consecutive session. As for the dollar, the USDIX began to o regain its power versus major currency after its previous series of losses on U.S.’s partial governmental shutdown. As of 10:35 GMT+3, the USDIX is trading at 80.63 after it opened at 80.49 while recording an intraday high of 80.67 and low of 80.46. #egyptyard
Posted on: Thu, 10 Oct 2013 10:56:59 +0000