Rep. Tim Huelskamp of Kansas issued a no-nonsense plea to President Barack Obama on Thursday: Put your cards on the table.
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In a message to the commander-in-chief delivered on "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV, the Republican congressman said:
"At the end of the day, you don't have to sit down in a room [with Republicans] just to put something down on paper.
"Mr. President, tell us what your offer is, what you'd like to see instead of just saying you're not going to negotiate."
Huelskamp said the debt-ceiling crisis must be solved now — once and for all.
"We're against the wall . . . I don't think we ought to wait six weeks. Let's solve it now," he said.
"We are already running a $700 billion deficit and we're already into the new year and losing money every day . . . It's time for action, not time for more time.
"This idea that, gosh let's just borrow another couple hundred billion dollars and somehow that'll be a good thing, I don't think so."
Meanwhile, Huelskamp said, Congress should continue to pass bills to keep the government open.
"We've passed more than a dozen of those and . . . as of two days ago they hadn't had a vote since the shutdown started. I mean it's as if the whole Senate's on furlough and that the president is not engaging," Huelskamp said.
"I don't know how you again give him six more weeks of borrowing money is somehow going to force the president to negotiate as most Americans would demand . . .
"His final offer was this: give me everything I want, we'll sign it all into law, and then I'll negotiate sometime in the future — which is silly if it wasn't so serious."
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