Johnny Isakson: “today when the Chaplain opened the Senate, he prayed for divine guidance to end the paralysis of analysis in Congress. I…”

“today when the Chaplain opened the Senate, he prayed for divine guidance to end the paralysis of analysis in Congress. I thought it was an excellent point. When I heard the two leaders speak today I realized where that paralysis was. We were paralyzed by analyzing our differences and failing to look at what we have reached common ground on already. I have been worried about a default on our debt for some time, but right now I am worried about Congress defaulting on our country. Failure should not be an option for us in this case and it is time we started finding common ground. So for the purpose of discussion, I want to put forward some thoughts about where we agree, some identification of where we do not but where we could be. We have already agreed, in one form or another--whether it was the Vice President's group or the Speaker's group or whoever--that we ought to have a $1 trillion downpayment in initial cuts to bring about deficit reduction. There is common agreement between both sides in the Senate and I think in the House as well that we need a short-term committee, equally divided in a partisan way, to come up with at least another $1.8 trillion that results in reductions in debt and in deficit. We have agreed on those two things. Third, we have agreed we do not want to default on our debt.…”