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As part of the agreement reached to avoid a default last year, both military and non-military spending is set to face large cuts next year -- with a $500 billion cut over ten years to the defense budget -- as part of an automatic "sequester."
Today House Republicans sought to avoid these cuts to the military budget by instead cutting from other parts of the budget -- namely, programs for the neediest Americans. The $310 billion in cuts that would take place over ten decades the Republicans voted for would, as one example, cut off food stamps to 1.8 million Americans.
Al Sharpton, host of Politics Nation, noted that House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan (WI) -- the Ayn Rand devotee who is infamous for crafting a budget that would privatize Medicare -- ironically took to the floor of the House of Representatives to claim that he just wants there to be more upward mobility in the United States.
"The GOP believes in upward mobility...for the rich," joked Sharpton. Democratic Rep. Chris Van Hollen (MD) joined Politics Nation to discuss the Republicans' vote. He noted that Democrats offered an alternative deficit-cutting measure that would've, among other things, reduced farm subsidies and increased taxes on some of the richest Americans. "They didn't even let us have a vote on the alternative," protested the congressman.