"How can Congress go on a recess with the country in the shape it's in?" asks a constituent of Bobby Scott, a Democratic congressman for the Hampton Roads region of Virginia, to applause and cries of "Amen!" The angry voter is referring to the "sequester", an unpopular slate of cuts to the federal budget due to take effect on March 1st unless Congress intervenes. The cuts, as Mr Scott explains, were intended to be so painful that lawmakers would feel obliged to come up with some sort of substitute. But Congress's current break ends just four days before the deadline, with no alternative in sight.
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