Cuts like a knife, but manufacturing programs all right

摘要

A s Congress deals with its budget-cutting fever, it actually may spare a major manufacturing support program. Republicans left alone the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) in its plan to whack away 61 billion dollars in federal spending for fiscal 2011. Capitol Hill pundits believe that conservative Democrats may agree to go as far as 20 billion dollars to 30 billion dollars in cuts. Fiscal 2011 started last Oct. 1, but Congress never settled on a 2011 budget, passing instead a line of temporary budgets called "continuing resolutions"-the last one expiring in mid-April.