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U.S. stocks might be on the rise, recovering from the Japanese crisis and Middle Eastern oil worries, but further vacillation by the U.S. Congress could throw the economy into disarray.

The legislature has just two weeks to agree on a budget for this fiscal year, and it's already running on borrowed time created by a temporary measure. The stalemate comes as a result of the Republican Party's resurgence in 2010, when a swathe of conservative Republicans - many backed by the many-headed Tea Party movement - took control of the House of Representatives. Many of these new freshmen representatives ran on platforms that focused on the $1.65 trillion deficit the government will create this year and the growing scale of the national debt.

In scope, the U.S.' borrowing eclipses every other nation, though its massive economy and the dollar's dominance means its not likely to suffer the fate of, for instance, Portugal. The Iberian nation's government collapsed this week after Prime Minster José Sócrates resigned when the parliament failed to pass through new austerity measures.

President Barack Obama is unlikely to resign his position at the White House, but he is working with senators and representatives to craft a new plan that the Wall Street Journal reports might cut as much as $20 billion of government spending. 

Obama faces another line of criticism when it comes to foreign policy, as well. The Republican Party, led by old-guard firebrand Newt Gingrich, has ironically abandoned its hawkish stance to assault the president on his handling of the Libyan civil war, while Obama's rhetorical doveishness has fallen in favor of a rather more muscular interventionist principle.

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