After finally finishing up work on the budget for the current fiscal year on Thursday, the House jumps into the next phase of this debate with a vote today on a GOP budget outline for next year.
The plan from Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), the Chairman of the House Budget Committee, has created an outcry among Democrats, who say the GOP plan will do away with Medicare, Medicaid and hundreds of worthy programs in the budget.
"The vote will tell a story of two distinct visions for America," said Rep. Kathy Castor (D-FL), who stood in the Well of the House with a giant poster board sign that read "SAVE MEDICARE."
"The Republican plan to destroy Medicare...betrays our American values," Castor said bluntly.
While that drew an immediate retort from Ryan, it is just a taste of what's ahead in the playbook of Democrats, who feel they can win over senior citizens and Independent voters by casting the GOP as the party that will mindlessly cut back the budget.
This will be the first time in two years that the House has approved a budget resolution, which is basically a framework for a spending plan that must be hammered out in coming months.
Last year, Democrats didn't even try to approve a budget outline, as they punted the entire budget past the elections - that's what the House and Senate finally okayed yesterday.
Now, instead of battling over $39 billion in cuts - or however much they really were - the focus will move up to trillions of dollars
"Our proposal brings federal spending back to 20 percent, consistent with the post-war average, and reduces deficits by $4.4 trillion," Ryan argues about the GOP plan.
Obviously, the Senate may do something much different when it comes to budget planning, since Democrats are in charge of that body.
Senate Budget Chairman Kent Conrad (D-ND) told us in the hallway this week that he expects to bring forth a budget plan after lawmakers return from their Easter Break.
Will a divided Congress really sign off on trillions in cuts when it just took two months to finalize $39 billion?
Stay tuned.
