The congressional leadership has reached a two-year budget deal that all but eliminates the notion of "sequester" and adds $80 billion in spending. The deal is the brainchild of outgoing speaker of the House John Boehner, who used incoming speaker Paul Ryan's budget template from 2013 as a starting point. In addition to insuring funding for the government through March 2017, the bill would also raise the debt ceiling, good until that date. CNN: The product was the result of weeks of negotiations between Boehner, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid. The bill would raise spending caps by $80 billion -- $50 billion in the first year and $30 billion in the second year -- divided equally between defense and domestic programs. Even though Ryan's fingerprints aren't on the deal -- a deliberate move by the presumptive speaker and Boehner -- the framework of the agreement is very...(Read Full Post)