A new Washington Post poll finds that 70% of Americans said they would support a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants, including 60% of Republicans.
But when the same question was asked of a separate sample of respondents, this time with Obama’s name attached to it, support dropped to 59% overall and just 39% among Republicans.
“I think the President came to power with a worldview that’s fundamentally different than mine. The sense that he wanted to reduce U.S. influence in the world. He wanted to take us down a peg.”
— Former Vice President Dick Cheney, in an interview on CBS This Morning.
Jon Stewart comments on Pope Benedict’s surprise announcement that he’s stepping down to read books and pray:
“”Isn’t that what the pope was doing? Sounds to me like the only thing he’s losing in retirement is the waving.”
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Charlie Cook: “Don’t be surprised if the barometric pressure in Washington’s atmosphere and the blood pressures of many Beltway denizens shoot up this week. As emotional, important, and timely as the debates over immigration and gun control are, the increasing likelihood that budget sequestration will, in fact, kick in March 1 is just now starting to sink in.”
“The thinking behind sequestration was that the penalty for not
sufficiently reducing the deficit would be so draconian that members of
Congress would do whatever it took to avoid it. No one realized that
quite a few members from both parties would prefer sequestration to
making the painful concessions necessary for compromise–but that’s where
we are.”
Byron York reports the GOP “appears more and more prepared to keep the sequester as it currently stands.”
Washington Post: “Rarely have State of the Union addresses moved public opinion, and rarely have they led to the kind of broad legislative accomplishments that presidents propose. For all the ritual and attention surrounding these speeches, the State of the Union is, well, sort of lame.”
Roll Call has 10 things to watch for in tonight’s speech.
North Korea confirmed “that it had conducted its third, long-threatened nuclear test… posing a new challenge for the Obama administration in its effort to keep the country from becoming a full-fledged nuclear power,” the New York Times reports.
“The test drew a crescendo of international condemnation Tuesday, with President Obama calling it a ‘highly provocative act’ that demands ‘swift and credible action by the international community’ against North Korea. Russia, Britain, South Korea and the United Nations similarly quickly condemned the blast.”
Marc Ambinder notes five things to watch for after the North Korean test.
“Senate Democrats are pushing to quickly confirm Jacob Lew as Treasury secretary, but at a hearing Wednesday, Republicans plan to grill him about his tenure in the financial world,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
“Lew has less experience in business and finance than in government budgeting–a fact that Republicans could highlight. And his business experience–primarily working at Citigroup Inc. from 2006 until 2009–will draw attention because the bank needed a taxpayer-funded bailout to survive the financial crisis.”
“Some Senate Republicans are prepared to filibuster Chuck Hagel’s nomination to become the next secretary of defense, a rare maneuver to block a Cabinet-level nominee that demonstrates the lingering hostility from GOP senators toward a man who used to serve with them,” Politico reports.
“But the filibuster threat — reiterated Monday by Sen. Jim Inhofe, the top Republican on the Armed Services Committee — would make Hagel just the third Cabinet nominee in history to require 60 votes to overcome a filibuster on the Senate floor. The other two nominees were President Ronald Reagan’s 1987 choice to head his Commerce Department, C. William Verity, and President George W. Bush’s 2006 choice of Dirk Kempthorne to be secretary of the interior.”
The Washington Post reports on the lawmaker who will spend up to seven hours staking out seats near to the aisle to be seen shaking President Obama’s hand as he enters the House chamber.
“They’ve been around for at least 46 years. For the people on the aisle, the State of the Union is a rare night when a low-ranking legislator can score both a TV appearance and a personal audience with the president. Just try to ignore the elbows thrown by your colleagues. And be brief.”
“The squatters on the House aisle are now a familiar part of the State
of the Union ritual — a signal that the night has evolved from from a
speech into a show, and then from the president’s show to more of an
ensemble piece.”
After insisting he wasn’t a “deadbeat dad” throughout his failed campaign for re-election, former Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) filed court papers seeking to end his obligation to pay $2,134 per month in child support, the Chicago Sun Times reports.
“But once again, Walsh insists he’s no deadbeat. Both he and his attorney say that since he is no longer employed as a congressman, they want to ‘modify’ the previous agreement so that he pays 20 percent of his current salary.”
Ben Smith: “President Obama’s enemies often accuse him, in the starkest political terms, of crudely acting to shift resources toward his political base: green-energy donors, single women, Latinos, African-Americans.”
“But the next 12 months are likely to reveal the opposite. Imminent elements of Obama’s grandest policy move, the health-care overhaul known as ObamaCare, are calculated to screw his most passionate supporters and to transfer wealth to his worst enemies.”
But Ezra Klein disagrees: “Universal health-care systems in general, and Obamacare in particular, move money from the rich to the poor.”
Coming soon: The Forgotten Presidents: Their Untold Constitutional Legacy by Michael J. Gerhardt
The Cloakroom: 3 reasons Marco Rubio isn’t going to be the GOP nominee in 2016.
Roll Call released it’s annual list Capitol Hill’s leading staffers — “the people behind the scenes who wield the power and drive their party’s message.”
“Frustrated by the months of non-stop budget fights, Senate Republicans are set to mount a fiscal counteroffensive this week with the reintroduction of a balanced-budget amendment,” National Review reports.
“According to a Senate GOP aide, the legislation would cap federal spending at 18 percent of GDP. It would also require a supermajority for tax hikes and debt-limit increases.”
Greg Sargent: “Requiring a supermajority on the debt ceiling is the direct opposite of fiscal responsibility: Since the debt ceiling only constitutes authorizing borrowing to pay bills already incurred by Congress, it could set spending by regular majority rule (as it currently does), while requiring a supermajority to borrow the money necessary to pay the bills it racks up. It would make default — and widespread economic havoc — more likely.”
Just published: The Art of Betrayal: The Secret History of MI6 by Gordon Corera.
Roll Call: “The Senate panel overseeing Pentagon nominations plans to hold a vote Tuesday on the contentious nomination of Chuck Hagel to become Defense secretary, and while the panel may vote along party lines to recommend confirmation to the full Senate, some GOP lawmakers are expected to hold it up.”
Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) “has veered sharply away from the reform and pro-business policies he followed during his first two years in office and is ‘adrift’ on a course of murky proposals, frequent indecision, and political obsessions focused on re-election next year and the presidency in 2016,” insiders tell Fred Dicker.
“The insiders, some of whom have known Cuomo for decades, said the governor has become so obsessed with maintaining what until recently were record-high job-approval ratings that he has refused, for fear of alienating politically potent liberal voting blocs, to make tough decisions to cut costs for fiscally troubled local governments, reduce regulations to attract businesses, and approve hydrofracking for natural gas.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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