President Obama called on Congress Tuesday to pass legislation granting small businesses greater access to loans and providing them with tax incentives to better grow their operations.

House Rules Committee Chairwoman Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.) has "very serious concerns" about a White House proposal to give the president new powers to cut spending.

Slaugher is the most senior House member to question the Obama administration's proposal for a new "expedited rescission authority," which would allow the president to propose a package of specific cuts to spending provisions in recently approved bills and force Congress to take up-or-down votes on it.

"I believe very strongly in the separation of powers and I argued many years ago against expanding the line item veto," Slaughter said in a statement. "Because of that, I have very serious concerns about any new proposal that would dramatically reshape the balance of power between the executive and the legislative branches, as this new White House plan calls for."

Dodd, Johnson, Reed, Schumer, Shelby, Corker and Gregg are among the Senate conferees for Wall Street reform.

House Ways and Means Chairman Sandy Levin (D-Mich.) on Tuesday said despite bipartisan pushback on the tax increase for carried interest that is included in legislation extending several measures, the provision will not be changed. 

"We've already worked hard to balance all of the needs, here," he told reporters. "The basic principle is, if it's your money [at risk] you pay capital gains; if you're managing other people's money, essentially you pay ordinary income tax like everybody else." 

That assessment is not sitting well with several House Democrats.

Stocks took a nosedive Tuesday morning, dropping more than 2 percent in early trading amid tensions between North and South Korea and global economic concerns. 

The Dow Jones industrials fell sharply to around 9,800 and then began a slow creep upward as the markets weighed concerns over the European debt crisis and the falling value of the euro that was nearing a four-year low, as well as military tensions as North Korean leader Kim Jong-il put his troops on combat alert. 

European markets also fell and major indexes in Japan and Hong Kong were off by more than 3 percent. 

European Union leaders warned today of economic stagnation unless governments are proactive in promoting growth, although several countries are experiencing severe debt issues, making it difficult to provide stimulus to prop up those economies. 

After the market closed Monday at 10,066, the Dow was down 1,139 points from its April 26 high of 11,205. 

A $200 billion bill that revives several tax breaks is in a holding pattern again but is still on the week's agenda after a raucous hearing Monday night. 

There wasn't any resolution on the contentious extenders measure as a House Rules Committee hearing devolved into partisan sniping, most likely pushing the measure back to Wednesday so any remaining issues, especially among House Democrats, can be resolved. The bill was expected to be ready for House action Tuesday. 

The measure is a priority for House and Senate leadership and they are aiming to get the bill to President Barack Obama's desk by Memorial Day.  

House Ways and Means Chairman Sandy Levin (D-Mich.) and several other Democrats scheduled a Tuesday morning conference call with reporters about the way forward. 

House Rules Chairwoman Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.) on Monday was forced to apologize for the behavior of her committee after a hearing on legislation extending several measures devolved into an endless exchange of personal attacks and name-calling between the panelists and House Ways and Means Chairman Sandy Levin (D-Mich.), who testified before the committee about the extender bill.

The vote comes over the strong opposition of the White House, Defense Department and Treasury Department.

The Federal Reserve's payments into federal coffers will likely double because of its accrual of a larger, riskier portfolio of assets to stabilize the financial system, a nonpartisan agency said Monday. 

The Congressional Budget Office projects the central bank's payments to the Treasury will increase to $70 billion in fiscal 2010 and 2011, up from $34 billion in 2009, according to a report released Monday. 

"The increase reflects the Federal Reserve's larger portfolio of riskier assets, most of which are likely to earn a great deal more than the amount the system must pay in interest on reserves and other liabilities," CBO Director Doug Elmendorf posted on his blog today. 

The gains or losses ultimately realized from the Fed's activities during the financial crisis "will almost certainly deviate from CBO's estimates of the fair-value subsidies those actions provided," according to the report, requested by Senate Budget ranking member Judd Gregg (R-N.H.).