WASHINGTON, Nov 18 (Reuters) – A high-profile congressional effort to trim stubborn U.S. budget deficits appeared near collapse on Friday as Democrats rejected a scaled-back proposal from Republicans that contained few tax increases.

With Democrats and Republicans on a deficit-cutting “super committee” deadlocked ahead of a Wednesday deadline, House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner floated an offer to try to break the logjam on tax increases and benefit cuts.

The plan would save $643 billion over 10 years, about half of the panel’s goal of $1.2 trillion, but the two sides were unable to even agree what was in the plan.

Boehner aides said it included $229 billion in new revenues and fees. Democrats said it would only generate $3 billion in new revenue from closing a tax break for corporate jets.

“To have something on the table that does not ask the wealthiest people in the country to share (the burden) … is unconscionable,” said Senator John Kerry, a Democratic member of the super committee.

The panel will need to have a deal in place well before its Wednesday vote. The panel will work through the weekend if necessary, said Republican Representative Jeb Hensarling, a committee co-chair.

“We are painfully aware of the deadline and it is staring us in the face,” he told reporters.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Members of a U.S. Congress deficit-reduction committee considered scaling back their efforts Thursday amid a Republican split over taxes and mounting doubts of reaching a deal by next week’s deadline.

The 12-member “super committee” has until midnight on Wednesday, the day before the Thanksgiving holiday, to reach a deal to cut U.S. deficits by at least $1.2 trillion over 10 years.

“I feel we’re caught in a tailspin,” said a senior aide familiar with stalled talks.

Voicing the sentiment of many on Capitol Hill, another aide said: “It doesn’t look particularly promising. But this is a place that works deadline to deadline. We shall see.”

If it is unable to do so, automatic spending cuts would kick in across federal agencies, beginning in January 2013, two months after next year’s election.

Failure to get a deal would likely anger voters who have been rattled by budget fights this year that brought the government to the edge of a shutdown and the brink of default.

Congress’s approval rating stands at record low levels, and lawmakers are eager to prove that they are capable of governing as they head into the 2012 election season.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Republicans faced a divisive internal debate over taxes on Thursday as lawmakers from the party’s conservative wing urged a deficit-reduction committee to rule out any deal that includes tax increases.

The message in a letter from 72 rank-and-file Republican lawmakers further squeezes Republicans on the 12-member “super committee,” who are struggling to reach a deal with Democrats that would produce at least $1.2 trillion in budget savings over 10 years.

Republicans on the panel have floated a plan that would raise about $300 billion in taxes over 10 years, in a softening of the firm anti-tax stance they have taken in other budget battles this year.

Democrats say they will not back a plan that consists of spending cuts alone, and their latest proposal would raise the government’s 10-year tax haul by about $400 billion.

The panel faces a November 23 deadline.

Taxes are not the only issue. Republicans want to overhaul health and retirement benefit programs, while Democrats want to roll in measures to boost the struggling economy in the short term.

Democrats say they cannot go any further until they know where Republicans stand on taxes.

HONOLULU, Nov 13 (Reuters) – Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said he will step up efforts to supply energy to Asia after Washington delayed a decision on whether to approve a new oil pipeline from Canada to the United States.

In a subtle warning to Washington, Harper told Chinese President Hu Jintao that providing energy to Asia was an important priority for Canada.

“This does underscore the necessity of Canada making sure that we are able to access Asia markets for our energy products,” Harper told reporters on Sunday at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ meeting in Hawaii.

“That will be an important priority of our government going forward and I indicated that yesterday to the president of China.”

Citing health, safety and environmental concerns, President Barack Obama’s administration said it would now study a possible new route for TransCanada Corp’s Keystone XL pipeline.

The delay could end up killing the $7 billion project altogether if supporters back out or the administration is unable to chart a new route.

Canada is already the largest foreign supplier of oil, natural gas, electricity and uranium to the United States. The proposed pipeline has the capacity to move 700,000 barrels of crude produced from the Alberta tar sands to refineries in Texas.

HONOLULU (Reuters) – Canada and Mexico want to join talks to forge a free trade area in the Asia-Pacific region, giving a significant boost to the U.S.-led initiative to foster economic growth by tearing down trade barriers.

Japan, the world’s third-largest economy, said earlier it would like to join.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Sunday he was encouraged to take part by U.S. President Barack Obama.

“We looked at the outline of the criteria set by the partnership and they are all criteria that Canada can easily meet. So it is something we’re interested in moving forward on,” Harper said at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit of 21 nations in Hawaii.

A Mexican official told Reuters his government would ask on Sunday to join the talks. The United States welcomed the interest of its two neighbors, with all of them already partners in the NAFTA trade pact.

The proposed Transpacific Partnership pact now includes nine countries — the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Chile and Peru — that have committed to what they call a “high-standard” trade agreement.

They must approve new applicants. The TPP goal is to complete a detailed framework in 2012 and adding new members could slow the timetable.

HONOLULU (Reuters) – Canada wants to join talks on a proposed U.S.-led free trade agreement in the Asia-Pacific region that also may open its membership to Japan, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said on Sunday.

“We are expressing formally our willingness to join the Transpacific Partnership,” Harper told reporters at the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ meeting.

Harper said Canada made its decision after being encouraged by President Barack Obama to join.

“We looked at the outline of the criteria set by the partnership and they are all criteria that Canada can easily meet. So it is something we’re interested in moving forward on,” Harper said.

Negotiations on the Transpacific Partnership pact, or TPP, now include nine countries — the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Chile and Peru — that have committed to what they are calling a “high-standard” trade agreement.

Japan gave a boost to the negotiations on Friday by expressing its interest in joining the pact, which analysts see as important to ensuring the United States maintains a strong economic presence in the region as China continues to rise.

With Japan included, the proposed economic pact would be about 40 percent larger than the 27-nation European Union.

HONOLULU (Reuters) – Eli Lilly and Co has hit a tough spot with the pharmaceutical company’s top treatment now facing competition from cheaper generic brands and the looming loss of patent protection on other drugs.

“It may be one of our most challenging periods in our history because, as the way fate would have it, we lose patent protection on a number of products between now and 2014,” Lilly’s Chief Executive John Lechleiter told Reuters in an interview on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific summit.

Lilly’s best selling product, its $4.5 billion a year Zyprexa schizophrenia treatment, began facing cheaper generics in the United States a few weeks ago and the company will lose protection for antidepressant Cymbalta in 2013 and its Evista osteoporosis drug the year after.

“Right now I have got my hands full. My goal is to help Lilly navigate through this tough patch,” said Lechleiter, who joined Lilly in 1979 as an organic chemist and became CEO in 2008.

Lechleiter ruled out acquisitions to plug the hole left by Zyprexa and pointed to Lilly’s pipeline of potential medicines that were in the last stages of trials in the United States.

“You can’t just order up a new menu item like it’s McDonald’s. It’s a longer-term cycle. Investors understand that,” he said.

The Indiana-based company has forecast a minimum of $20 billion in sales, $3 billion in net income, and $4 billion in operating cash flow for the next few years.

HONOLULU, Nov 13 (Reuters) – Europe’s debt crisis and political gridlock in Washington are heightening business uncertainty among global corporations, but so far CEOs say strong global demand is offsetting any damage.

Washington’s problems pose a longer-term threat. Business leaders fear that lawmakers are losing the ability to perform basic functions, making Congress unable to tackle policy needed to ensure the United States remains competitive.

For now, companies from Caterpillar Inc to Eli Lilly and Co attending a CEO summit at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, said they are managing any loss of sales caused by turmoil in southern Europe.

“We are seeing very minor impact,” Doug Oberhelman, the chief executive of Caterpillar told reporters on the sidelines of the APEC CEO summit here in Honolulu.

APEC finance ministers on Thursday agreed that they need to shore up their defenses against fallout from a euro-zone debt crisis that threatens to pose a drag on growth for many months ahead.

Oberhelman said the debate about Italy and Greece, which are struggling to stay solvent, has raised the degree of uncertainty in the world. But in terms of Caterpillar’s outlook, strong demand elsewhere has offset any losses.

“Other parts of Europe and Eastern Europe and Africa are doing fairly well and will more than compensate for southern Europe in our industry,” he said.

HONOLULU (Reuters) – Asia-Pacific leaders will call on countries on Sunday to do what they can to prop up economic growth, rallying around the common threat from Europe’s debt crisis despite divisions over trade and currency policies.

Fresh off a rare success in securing agreement on the outlines of a regional trade deal, the heads of the 21 nations that make up the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum will turn their attention to the more immediate problem of preventing contagion from Europe.

After talks on Sunday, leaders are expected to release a statement expressing concern that Europe’s unresolved debt troubles will spill over into the Asia-Pacific region.

Unlike the United States, where the Federal Reserve has already cut interest rates to near zero, many Asian economies have room to reduce benchmark borrowing costs to try to spur faster growth. Most of them also boast healthy public finances, giving them more leeway to boost government spending.

“We’re not going to see massive growth out of Europe until the problems are solved,” U.S. President Barack Obama said. “And that will have a dampening effect on the economy. But if we can at least contain the crisis, then one of the great opportunities we have is to see the Asia-Pacific region as an extraordinary engine for growth.”

But that engine is slowing down and inflation-wary Asian leaders don’t necessarily want to rev it back up. China is reluctant to unleash another huge stimulus package like the one it launched in 2009 because of concern over wasteful spending.

China’s economic growth will likely dip below 9 percent next year for the first time in a decade. That would still be four times faster than the U.S. economy is likely to grow.

HONOLULU (Reuters) – President Barack Obama and China’s Hu Jintao will pitch differing trade agendas on Saturday as an antidote to weak global growth, as they try to sidestep the European debt crisis looming over an Asia-Pacific summit.

The heads of the world’s two biggest economies will address business leaders in back-to-back morning speeches at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation CEO summit in Honolulu, and later meet face to face. But Obama and Hu do not see eye to eye on how best to promote transpacific trade.

Obama arrived in Hawaii late on Friday at the start of a nine-day Asian trip during which he will attempt to reassert U.S. influence over the region’s course in economic and security affairs. An unstated goal is to ensure China does not muscle the United States aside from its traditional Pacific role.

Obama hopes to leave his native state with at least the outline of a final deal on the Transpacific Partnership, a regional trade pact being negotiated between the United States and eight other countries.

Japan enhanced the stature of the U.S.-led regional trade initiative by announcing on Friday that it was interested in joining the talks, and other countries including Mexico and Canada also have indicated they might like to participate.

China is not part of these trade talks, and views them warily.

The differing views were captured on Friday in a politely pointed public exchange between top American and Chinese trade officials.