Obama to meet Republicans over stimulus package

US president Barack Obama is most likely heading towards the Capitol Hill on Tuesday to meet the Republican lawmakers, who seem to have started finding fault in his USD 825 billion mega economic stimulus package in its current format.

Several Republicans leaders including the House Minority Leader, John Boehner, and Senator John McCain came out in open against the stimulus package and said this needs to be rewritten and revisited or else many of their lawmakers would not vote for it.

Obama, who is keen to get the bill on his table by mid-February so that the money flows into the market as soon as possible, is expected to be travelling to the Capitol to have a meeting with the Republican leaders in his effort listen to their views and persuade them to help him get the Congressional nod at the earliest.

In his first radio address, Obama said Saturday that the plan would revive the economy and create three to four million jobs in the next few years. He also announced a massive investment into the country's infrastructure sector as part of his goal to revive the US economy.

"If it's the plan I see today, put me down in the 'no' category. I think a lot of Republicans will vote 'no' because they see this as a lot of wasteful Washington spending padding the bureaucracy and doing nothing to create jobs and save jobs," Boehner told NBC news channel on Sunday. 

Republican leaders who met Obama in the White House Friday along with their Democratic counterparts and offered their support besides their reservations on certain issues, said on Sunday that they want more tax cuts instead of the primarily use of federal money to help States and to fund infrastructure projects as well as energy, education and healthcare programmes.

"I am opposed to most of the provisions in the bill. As it stands now, I would not support it," McCain told Fox News in an interview. "We need to make tax cuts permanent, and we need to make a commitment that there'll be no new taxes. We need to cut payroll taxes. We need to cut business taxes," he said, adding that the stimulus package needs a major rewrite.

Another Republican leader, senator Lindsey Graham in an interview to CNN called the stimulus plan a "non-starter" and said he would not vote for it.

"The people spending the money are not going to be the ones paying it back. It's going to be your kids and your grandkids. I'd like to get together in a room, Republicans and Democrats, and figure this out," he said.

However, the House of Representative speaker, Nancy Pelosi, and the vice president, Joe Biden, were confident that the stimulus package would meet the Obama-deadline of February 16 despite Republican resistance.