President Obama on Deficit Reduction: “If Not Now, When?”

President Barack Obama responds to a question during a news conference in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House on the status of efforts to find a balanced approach to the debt limit and deficit reduction, July 11, 2011. (Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)

Today, President Obama hosted a news conference at the White House to discuss the status of efforts to find a balanced approach on deficit reduction.  Over the weekend, the President and Vice President met with Congressional leadership at the White House as part of the ongoing negotiations. 

During his remarks, the President encouraged members of Congress on both sides to work together to solve our long term deficit problems now, rather than finding short term solutions:

I will not sign a 30-day or a 60-day or a 90-day extension.  That is just not an acceptable approach.  And if we think it’s going to be hard -- if we think it’s hard now, imagine how these guys are going to be thinking six months from now in the middle of election season where they’re all up.  It’s not going to get easier.  It’s going to get harder.  So we might as well do it now -- pull off the Band-Aid; eat our peas.  (Laughter.)  Now is the time to do it.  If not now, when? 

We keep on talking about this stuff and we have these high-minded pronouncements about how we've got to get control of the deficit and how we owe it to our children and our grandchildren. Well, let's step up.  Let's do it.  I'm prepared to do it.  I'm prepared to take on significant heat from my party to get something done.  And I expect the other side should be willing to do the same thing -- if they mean what they say that this is important.

Check out the video of the President’s press conference or use the jump links to skip to the answers to questions you’re most interested in.

The questions below are paraphrased from the questions asked by reporters during the news conference:

• What is your plan if Republicans continue to oppose any tax increases? If Congress passed a short-term, stop-gap measure would you veto it?
• Do you see any path to a deal if Republicans don't budge on taxes?
• The latest CBS News poll showed that only 24 percent of Americans said you should raise the debt limit to avoid an economic catastrophe and 69 percent oppose raising the debt limit. Isn’t the problem that you and others have failed to convince the American people that we have a crisis, and how are you going to change that?
• Do you think Speaker Boehner will come back to the $4 trillion deal?
• In the $4 trillion deal, it seems to be now at about four-to-one spending to taxes. Why are we at that level? Can you clarify your Social Security position -- would any of the money from Social Security go toward the deficit as opposed to back into the trust fund?
• With unemployment now at 9.2 percent and a large chunk of those lost jobs coming from the private sector, is now a really good time to cut trillions of dollars in spending? How will we still create jobs? What do you say to members of your own party who say it doesn’t contribute to the deficit?
• Have you worked with new U.S. business leaders at all to lobby Congress to raise the debt ceiling? And if so, who are you talking to?
• As the clock ticks down, is the administration working on any sort of contingency plans if things don’t happen by August?
• You said that the Speaker faces tough politics in his caucus. Do you have complete confidence that he can deliver the votes on anything that he agrees to? Is he in control of his caucus?
• Your confidence in Speaker Boehner wasn’t shaken by him walking away from the big deal he said he wanted?
• What say you about Congressman Chaka Fattah’s bill, the Debt Free America Act? Do you support that bill? Are you supporting the Republican bill that is similar to his, modeled after Congressman Fattah’s bill?