WASHINGTON — President Obama's first budget, unveiled with great fanfare two months ago, started out like a plan that Robin Hood would love: He proposed taxing the wealthy to ease the burden on the middle class.
But so far, Congress has not rushed to follow his lead.
The House and Senate approved a $3.5-trillion federal budget outline Wednesday that embraces, in general terms, Obama's top priorities in healthcare, energy and education. But lawmakers have turned a cold shoulder to many of the president's proposals to shift wealth and federal subsidies from the rich to the less affluent.
Congress has called for ending Obama's signature campaign promise to the middle class -- tax credits of as much as $800 for many families -- after two years. And lawmakers did not endorse his proposal to curb tax deductions for the upper class to help pay for healthcare reform, but did keep in place billions of dollars in subsidies to agriculture.
Much of the debate in the House and Senate has focused on GOP charges that Democrats would tax and spend too much, creating a projected deficit of $1.2 trillion in 2010 and laying a debt burden on generations to come.
"Generational theft," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) called it.
Democrats responded that the budget was their best effort to address the economic problems that President Bush left behind.
Obama "inherited this mess," said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.). "He's expected to clean it up."
In the end, no Republicans in either chamber voted for the budget resolution. But underlying the predictable partisan byplay, the budget debate has been a monument to the durability of the special interests and political forces that make it hard even for Democrats to curb subsidies to the wealthy.
"When you listen to the debate, it's clear that there is a lot of resistance to a lot of the things Obama did," said James R. Horney, a budget analyst with the liberal-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Coming just three months after Democrats took the White House and retained control of Congress, the budget represented the party's first stab at changing government priorities after years of complaints that GOP policies were unfairly skewed to the wealthy.
The budget blueprint passed 233 to 193 in the House, with 17 Democrats joining the opposition. The Senate vote was 53 to 43, with three Democrats voting against the bill. The opponents included Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, who announced Tuesday he was leaving the Republican Party to become a Democrat.
