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Michelle Nunn on Budget & Economy |
A: We cannot fool around with defaulting. It's part of what's created the uncertainty that we know, at least economically, the threats of shutting down, the threats of default. Business needs certainty in order to invest and it's important that our leaders act responsibly around this issue.
Q. What did you make of the House Republican's last attempt to tie debt ceiling to restoring the sequester cuts to veteran pensions?
A: What I would say is we need to, as much possible, ask our leaders to act without brinksmanship or gamesmanship around these issues.
Q. So you're against the sequester?
A: As people have said repeatedly, sequestration is the absolute wrong way of making the cuts. Nobody in business would cut across the board, they would cut strategically. And we are going to have to make difficult cuts but we are not going to do it effectively when we do it through sequestration.
In order to afford these necessary investments, we have to make tough choices and cut spending. Federal budget deficits and rising debt inhibit our ability to make long-term investments critical to growing our economy, including in education, research, infrastructure, and workforce training. We need to be making decisions now to address the long-term growth of entitlements. We need to make smart short and mid-term investments to drive growth, and make long-term fiscal decisions that will ensure a strong economy and expanded opportunity for the next generation.
But in an interview, Nunn--who has made level-headedness a central theme of her campaign--didn't exactly offer full support to the White House's position of not negotiating with Republicans to end the federal shutdown and to raise the federal debt limit before the Oct. 17 deadline. "I support the Congress coming together to work out a resolution that will ensure that we do not default and that we safeguard and secure the economy," Nunn said. "I think that we need to move forward. We cannot allow for what I call everything from brinkmanship to holding hostage our democracy in order to what I think is just jeopardizing the economy."