he wantspeople to do is have an exchange of those ideas

"The key right now is to make sure that we keep politics to aminimum," said the president, who met Republicans in both housesof Congress a week after taking office on a promise to seekconsensus and end partisan gridlock. Shortly before Obama arrived, House Minority Leader JohnBoehner told fellow Republicans that in its current form, he couldnot vote for the stimulus and encouraged fellow House Republicansto vote against it, his spokesman said. The House of Representatives plans to vote on the stimulus onWednesday. Pressed on whether Obama expected to get more than a dozen orso Republican votes in the House, White House spokesman RobertGibbs said: "We'll take what we can get." Obama told the legislators he understood that some of themmight not support the measure but he said it still was importantto have the discussion "He said ...

I understand that some of you aren't going tovote for this," Gibbs said "That's fine But what ... he wantspeople to do is have an exchange of those ideas." CONSERVATIVE DEMOCRATS' CONCERNS Meanwhile, a bloc of conservative Democrats won a commitmentfrom the White House for efforts to balance the budget, enablingmany of them to support the stimulus plan. In a letter to Congress, Obama budget director Peter Orszagsaid the government must eventually get back to paying fornon-emergency spending without boosting the deficit. Even so, Obama wants the political cover that some supportfrom the opposition party would bring for an unproven plan thatwill hugely increase America's budget deficit and may or may nothalt the economy's downward slide. The new president faces an economic crisis that seems toworsen by the day. companies are cutting tens of thousands of jobs astroubles mount in the financial industry. "The main message I have is that the statistics every dayunderscore the urgency of the economic situation," Obama said."The American people expect action." Republicans complain that Obama's plan would financeDemocrats' pet projects such as $16 billion in grants forcollege students instead of creating jobs or stimulatingconsumer spending "I think the president is sincere," Boehner said.

"We lookforward to continue to work with him to improve this package." Republicans agree the stumbling economy needs a rescuepackage. But they contend that the Democrats' $550 billionspending proposal is excessive while a proposal to cut taxes byabout $275 billion does not go far enough. GOOD COP, BAD COP Some Republicans said their complaints were more aboutDemocrats in Congress than with Obama. "He's playing good cop and the Democratic leadership isplaying bad cop," said Rep.