NEWS: John Thune, the No. 2 Senate GOP leader, says in interview Senate Repubs want to leverage the next US debt limit increase to force federal spending cuts and changes to Social Security and other entitlement programs. “There’s a set of solutions there that we really need to take on if we’re going to get serious about making these programs sustainable and getting this debt bomb at a manageable level before it’s too late,” Thune told Bloomberg editors and reporters in Washington.