Gop leaders shrug off veto threat on debt fix

WASHINGTON (AP) — Crisis concerns rising, House Republican leaders shrugged off a White House veto threat and an outbreak of tensions within their own party Wednesday as they built support for legislation to stave off the government default threatened for next week. Worried Wall Street sent stocks plunging on fears that political gridlock would prevail.

With some politicians talking of economic Armageddon, Americans coast to coast were suddenly focusing on debt and deficit matters that most would have dismissed as arcane until recently. Some lawmakers’ offices were inundated with phone calls and emails, many urging some kind of deal to avert the possibility of calamity.

Weary Washington pushed ahead, and there was even some hopeful talk.

“We’re getting there,” said House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, one day ahead of a scheduled vote on his GOP bill to cut trillions in federal spending in exchange for increasing the debt limit the government will collide with next Tuesday.

The While House disparaged the bill Republicans were working so hard to pass, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada was even more emphatic. “A big wet kiss for the right wing,” he called it.

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