Businessweek: “First, there’s intimidation. The lobby group has incited potentially ruinous consumer boycotts against firearm makers that fail to follow the NRA line with sufficient zeal. Second, regardless of some executives’ concerns about civil discourse, gun companies benefit financially from the NRA’s hype. Alarms about imminent gun confiscation–an NRA staple, despite its implausibility–reliably send firearm owners back to retail counters. Sales are booming.”
Bartender Behind Hidden Video Had Met Romney Before
The bartender who secretly filmed Mitt Romney’s infamous “47 percent” remarks told the Huffington Post he had actually met the candidate at a fundraiser two months earlier and “shared a typical bartender-to-patron moment.”
Said the bartender: “I handed him a diet Coke with lemon on it, because I was told that that’s what he drank… He took it and turned and didn’t say anything. I presented him the exact right drink that he wanted… Had it there, sitting there on a napkin. He took it out of my hand and turned his back without a ‘thank you’ or anything else.”
Lawmakers Headed to Rome
David Hawkings: “You’ll have Pope Francis to thank for a shortened period of legislating next week — and for an exception to new limitations on members’ overseas trips imposed by the sequester. House votes are sure to be called off Tuesday, the day of the papal inaugural mass at the Vatican, and more than a dozen lawmakers are likely to be sent there as the official congressional delegation.”
“Politically, there are two very simple rationales for scrambling the pre-recess schedule and spending more than is in the budget on a quick round trip to Rome: The American public won’t mind, and the members of Congress will demand it.”
USA Today reports Vice President Biden will lead a U.S. delegation to Rome for the installation ceremony of Pope Francis.
Stark Choices in Dueling Budgets
“The two budget proposals now in Congress present Americans with a choice even starker than the one between the presidential candidates last year,” the Los Angeles Times reports.
“Under the 10-year budget plan released by House Republicans this week, tax rates would fall for high-income Americans and corporations, defense spending would be bolstered, and more than 30 million uninsured people would lose access to government-backed healthcare. Food stamps, student loans and free school lunches for children would be cut.”
“The Senate Democrats’ plan, released Wednesday, would increase taxes on the wealthy and some corporations, cut the Pentagon budget and add $100 billion in highway and school construction spending. Their plan would make modest reductions in healthcare and other domestic programs.”
Wonk Wire‘s “chart of the day” highlights the differences between the two budgets.
Bonus Quote of the Day
“The politics are going to overwhelm the policy. It is good politics to oppose the black guy in the White House right now, especially for the Republican Party.”
— South Carolina state Rep. Kris Crawford (R), quoted by the Charleston Regional Business Journal.
Boehner Rejects Obama’s Charm Offensive
Speaker John Boehner: “So it was a good meeting. House Republicans welcomed the chance for a frank exchange of ideas with President Obama on Wednesday. Outreach is always positive, and more Republicans in this town need the opportunity to have an open dialogue with our president. I hope these discussions continue.”
“Yet, while this may have been the first time some of my colleagues have heard the president’s arguments so personally and directly, I’ve heard them all many times before. If we’re going to find bipartisan solutions, the president will have to move beyond the same proposals and Democratic dogma. For all of Washington’s focus on the president’s outreach to Republicans, it’s his engagement with members of his own party that will determine whether we succeed in dealing with the challenges facing our economy.”
Top Lawmaker Says Obama Spends More Time on Brackets
House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) hit back at President Obama for saying he doesn’t put a priority on achieving a balanced budget, The Hill reports.
Said McCarthy: “How can a president not want to balance the budget? How does he forgot what he said? One of his first goals in the first four years was to cut the deficit in half. Now he doesn’t care. He doesn’t even produce a budget. I’ll bet you this. I bet you he spends more time filling out his March Madness brackets than he does writing a budget.”
Paul Says Tax Code Should Not Mention Marriage
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) told National Review that the federal tax code should be reformed in a way to not exclude same-sex marriage.
Said Paul: “I’m an old-fashioned traditionalist. I believe in the historic and religious definition of marriage. That being said, I’m not for eliminating contracts between adults. I think there are ways to make the tax code more neutral, so it doesn’t mention marriage. Then we don’t have to redefine what marriage is; we just don’t have marriage in the tax code.”
Obama Defends Setting Up Outside Advocacy Group
President Obama admitted that Organizing for Action, the nonprofit group born from his reelection campaign, was a way to combat the pivotal “mistake” of his first term — allowing the populist enthusiasm behind his policy objectives to fade amid tough negotiations with Congress, The Hill reports.
Said Obama: “I think here in Washington, this idea has been viewed with some suspicion and people have been puzzled about what it is we’re trying to do, because the usual idea is this must be a mechanism to try to win the next election in 2014. What we’ve tried to explain to people is, no, I just actually want to govern — at least for a couple years. But I also want to make sure the voices of the people are actually heard in the debates that are going to be taking place.”
Snubbed at CPAC
Politico notes that neither New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) or Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) was invited to speak at CPAC this week, “one of the premier showcase events for national Republicans. The snub of Christie was more heavily covered –perceived as punishment for his post-Hurricane Sandy embrace of Obama — but both governors have run afoul of CPAC organizers in related ways.”
“Officials with the American Conservative Union, which hosts CPAC, caution not to draw any dramatic conclusions from the fact that Christie and McDonnell didn’t make the cut this year… But in an age when conservative advocacy groups, right-leaning media and a white-hot Republican base tend to reward the most confrontational and theatrical politicians, neither Christie nor McDonnell appears to be in the GOP sweet spot anymore.”
Quote of the Day
“Ultimately, it may be that the differences are just too wide.”
— President Obama, quoted by the New York Times, suggesting a “grand bargain” with Republicans to reduce the national debt may not be possible.
Hopes for Budget Deal Fade Again
President Obama’s meeting “with a restive and resistant House Republican majority on Wednesday underscored their deep divisions over fiscal policy as both sides acknowledged that an overarching budget compromise was in doubt despite a new push by the White House,” the New York Times reports.
“The hourlong discussion at the Capitol, and the release of a new budget by Senate Democrats on Wednesday that adds $100 billion in new stimulus spending and would impose higher taxes on large corporations and wealthy Americans, illustrated anew just how difficult it will be to resolve the issues that have split the Congress for years and created a perpetual cycle of deadline-driven short-term fiscal policy.”
Roll Call notes a key reason: “GOP leaders immediately shut the door on any compromises that would include new taxes.”
The Washington Post notes another: “While Democratic leaders are offering quiet support for Obama’s renewed campaign to strike a grand bargain with Republicans that would include cuts to Social Security and Medicare, a significant number of Democratic lawmakers are digging in their heels and vowing to protest any reduction in promised benefits.”
Bonus Quote of the Day
“So just because the election didn’t go our way, that means we’re supposed to change our principles? We’re supposed to just go along to get along? We reject that view.”
— Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), in an interview with National Review.
Obama Tells GOP His Priority is Not a Balanced Budget
President Obama told House Republicans “that balancing the budget is not his top priority,” Roll Call reports.
Rep. Mike Rogers (R-AL) reported that the president “diplomatically said ‘no’ to a balanced budget, explaining that eliminating the deficit is not his priority. Instead, the president said he is worried that the deep spending cuts that would be required to balance the budget would slow the nation’s economic recovery.”
Wonk Wire: The failure of austerity.
New Pope is Elected
“With a puff of white smoke from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel and to the cheers of thousands of rain-soaked faithful, a gathering of Catholic cardinals picked a new pope from among their midst on Wednesday — choosing the cardinal from Argentina, the first South American to ever lead the church,” the New York Times reports.
“The new pope, 76, Jorge Mario Bergoglio will be called Francis, the 266th pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church. He is also the first non-European leader of the church in more than 1,000 years.”
The Week notes Pope Francis firmly opposes abortion, same-sex marriage and contraception.
The GOP’s Real Agenda
Tim Dickinson: “After watching voters punish the GOP in the 2012 elections, Republican elites have been talking a brave game about reforms that would make the party less repulsive to Latinos, women and gay-friendly millennials…”
“Don’t be fooled. On the ground, a very different reality is unfolding: In the Republican-led Congress, GOP-dominated statehouses and even before the nation’s highest court, the reactionary impulses of the Republican Party appear unbowed. Across the nation, the GOP’s severely conservative agenda – which seeks to impose job-killing austerity, to roll back voting and reproductive rights, to deprive the working poor of health care, and to destroy agencies that protect the environment from industry and consumers from predatory banks – is moving forward under full steam.”
Students Surprise Bush with Flash Mob
Texas A&M university students surprised former President H.W. Bush with a flash mob.
Obama Wastes Big Opportunity
Jill Lawrence says President Obama squandered an opportunity in his ABC News interview because he “talked almost entirely in the cerebral, inside-Washington policy and strategy terms befitting two cerebral, inside-Washington strategists and policy wonks. In other words, Obama talked to Stephanopoulos instead of his audience.”
“Analogies and connections and details were missing. The human impact was missing. Even talking points seemed to be missing. I’d also take issue with Obama’s downbeat assessment of whether a grand fiscal bargain is achievable. Don’t we need a little presidential optimism and encouragement at this point? Where’s that yes-we-can spirit?”
