Obama, Republicans grudgingly grind to debt deal

WASHINGTON — US President Barack Obama on Thursday hosts his Republican foes for talks on an elusive deal to raise the US debt limit and avert an early-August default that could unleash global economic shock waves.The Washington Post reported that Obama planned to pitch Social Security reform and spending cuts to the Medicare health program, raising the prospect of a grand bargain that could infuriate his fellow Democrats.Obama and Vice President Joe Biden were to meet at 1500 GMT with leaders of the Republican-led House of Representatives and Democratic-held Senate as angry public rhetoric clouded the fate of private deal-making.Obama accused Republicans of "toying" with refusing to raise the ceiling on US borrowing, and using that like "a gun against the heads of the American people" to reject his calls for hiking taxes on the rich and corporations."What I'm hoping to see over the next couple of weeks is people put their dogmas aside, their sacred cows aside, they come together and they say, here's a sensible approach that reduces our deficit," he said.Obama did not mention specific cuts to the bedrock social programs that have been the pride of his Democratic party for decades, but the Post quoted an official as saying that such moves were under consideration."Obviously, there will be some Democrats who don't believe we need to do entitlement reform. But there seems to be some hunger to do something of some significance," the official told the Post. "These moments come along at most once a decade. And it would be a real mistake if we let it pass us by."The reported proposals would concern the Social Security retirement program and Medicare, a health insurance program for the elderly and disabled.Key Republicans meanwhile appeared to open cracks in what had been a unified party rejection of closing tax loopholes -- notably those benefiting purchasers of luxury goods like yachts or private jets -- as part of a final compromise.Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said he would be "glad to talk lo

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