Unpopular US Congress faces debt, jobs fights

New polls showed a 13 percent approval rate
of Congress in a Gallup study
© AFP/Getty Images/File Mark Wilson

WASHINGTON (AFP) – US lawmakers return to work next week after a month-long break, facing pitched battles over government spending, trade, and boosting the job-starved economy as the 2012 White House race heats up.

Polarized politicians got bracingly bad news Friday as the US government reported the economy added no jobs in August, ending 10 months of gains and fueling fears of recession in the world’s richest country.

And new polls showed the US public angry and disgusted with Washington, with President Barack Obama hitting an all-time low of voters disapproving of him by 52 to 42 percent in a Quinnipiac University survey.

The Congress fared even worse, slumped at 13 percent approval in a Gallup study.

The data raised the already high stakes for Obama’s speech to a rare joint session of the US Congress on Thursday, when he lays out his plan for assaulting 9.1 percent unemployment some 14 months before he faces the voters.

Republican House Speaker John Boehner will counter exactly one week later with an address at the Economic Club of Washington, laying out a rival strategy on an issue vital to Obama’s quest for a second term in November 2012.

And House Republicans plan regular votes to roll back at least 10 government environmental or labor regulations that they describe as “job-killing” restrictions smothering US businesses.

Those efforts are expected to fall short in the Democratic-held Senate, while Obama’s proposals are unlikely to clear the House, amid political dysfunction that fed a weeks-long fight over the US debt ceiling and cost Washington its top-notch debt rating with the Standard & Poor’s agency.

The bitterly divided and woefully unpopular Congress may also feud over trade pacts with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea, which the White House and key lawmakers promise will help create jobs.

Obama has called for swift approval of the three trade deals, while Democrats have said they want to be sure that a special assistance package for workers who lose their jobs due to overseas competition also clears Congress.

Another marquee battle will focus on a 12-member “supercommittee” created in the hard-fought debt-limit deal and now tasked with slashing at least $1.2 trillion from government deficits over 10 years.

If the panel cannot agree on a compromise by November 23, or if the compromise fails to clear Congress by December 23, that would trigger deep cuts to security programs and to providers in the popular Medicare health program for the elderly and disabled.

Asked about the prospects for agreement, veteran US Congress-watched Norm Ornstein told AFP: “Everything on the surface would say it looks pretty awful.”

But lawmakers could find common ground in the face of “growing alarm — for all the obvious reasons — over the state of the economy and the global economy.”

Still, Obama’s speech will likely open a new rift with House Republicans who refuse to accept new spending proposals and tax increases on the richest Americans and wealthy corporations, and want steep cuts in expenditures in programs dear to Democrats.

The plan is expected to consist of a mix of old and new proposals, including a call for tax rises on the wealthiest Americans, more spending on job creating infrastructure projects and an extension to a payroll tax cut.

Republicans, who once favored that reduction, now question its effectiveness and have signalled they may fight the White House.

But at least one fight that had been expected — a showdown over whether Obama overstepped his authority by committing US forces to strike Libya — may not materialize given the rebels’ rout of Moamer Kadhafi’s forces from Tripoli.

An aide to Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry told AFP lawmakers were now “unlikely” to debate his resolution authorizing Obama’s use of force “given the circumstances.”