This morning, Jonathan Weisman has a very interesting article for The Washington Post reporting that Republicans will likely see no end to difficult votes when Congress comes back into session in September.

Lawmakers are drafting proposals that would cut billions of dollars from the growth of Medicaid, slice into student loans just as students return to college, pare back food stamps and trim farm price supports in the midst of a midwestern drought.

The raft of bills, due out of 16 committees in the House and Senate by Sept. 16, will present the Republican Party its toughest test of fiscal austerity in nearly a decade. For years, the party has embraced the rhetoric of small government while overseeing legislation that has helped boost federal spending by more than a third since the GOP took control of Congress 10 years ago. Now, Republican lawmakers will be faced with the tough votes needed to slow that growth and enact the first cuts in entitlement spending since 1997.

Among the proposals listed by Weisman are:

• A $7 billion cut to student loans
  
• A $10 billion cut to Medicaid
  
• Authorization of drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve

While all of these votes will be politically difficult, I will be especially interested to hear how the GOP will attempt to spin the cuts to student loans, which hit middle class and lower class alike.