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Bush tax cut may be heading for compromiseWASHINGTON (CNN) -- House and Senate budget negotiators plan to meet Wednesday afternoon to reconcile the major differences between their competing tax and spending blueprints for next year.
"The two priorities have to find a commonality. That's what this negotiation is about," House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Illinois, said after a meeting of the House GOP conference. The Republican-controlled House passed a budget resolution that calls for $1.6 trillion in tax cuts over the next 10 years and set a spending increase of 4 percent for next year. The Senate, which is evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats, passed a smaller $1.2 trillion tax cut but gave an 8 percent boost to federal spending. After a Tuesday meeting with President Bush, Senate GOP leaders acknowledged they could not win support for a tax cut as large as the House version. Hastert said he understands the "reality" in the Senate: "I hope, eventually, we'll get to $1.6 trillion somehow. Probably somewhere in between is where we're going to come out on this thing." Although Bush has said he would not vary from the $1.6 trillion figure, in an interview Wednesday with CNN he refused to commit to a specific figure. "My answer is, Let's get as much as possible for the American people," Bush said. House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Missouri, said Wednesday's negotiation would be tough. "I think it's going to be a tougher conference than any we've seen in the past. This budget shoots with real bullets," he said. "Every time they step it [the tax cut] up a dollar they've got to take a dollar out of education or health care or the environment, and it's going to be a very painful exercise." RELATED STORIES:
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