Health Care, Spending Cuts | featured news

"It's in areas like health care, education and job training," Packer said. "Programs are closing or are being cut, layoffs are happening. It's not just waiting in line a bit longer at the airport."

Top congressional Republicans on Sunday suggested they could compromise on the two biggest issues -- healthcare and taxes -- that stand in the way of a deal to get the United States' debt under control.

President Barack Obama, two years into a presidency that increased spending to prime a weak economy, is turning his attention to the nation's crushing debt and trying to counter a Republican anti-deficit plan with a framework of his own that tackles politically sensitive health care programs while also increasing taxes....

A Republican plan for the 2012 budget would cut more than $4 trillion over the next decade, more than even the president s debt commission proposed, with spending caps as well as changes in the Medicare and Medicaid health programs, its principal author said Sunday.