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We begin with cats and birds this week. Iron-lovers across the land were dismayed by the news that the Monopoly folks were discontinuing their favorite token, but cat-lovers were enthused by the feline token which will take its place. Being America, this was done via online voting. In avian news, the Baltimore Ravens won the Super Bowl. The bird is the word!
We seem to have a gang problem on Capitol Hill once again.
Since I've written three full-length articles already this week, I'm going to slack off a bit and today just run with a few items which caught my eye. So, for once, a short column today. As always, these are presented in "three-dot" format, in homage to the late great Herb Caen...
We stand at the beginning of a grand debate on immigration. America goes through these grand debates every generation or so, and what remains constant is that both sides in the fight can be counted upon to accuse the other side of "playing politics" with the immigration issue. This has, indeed already begun.
President Barack Hussein Obama's second inauguration pretty much dominated the political news this week.
The Republican House just scored a political victory. While meaningless in financial fact, they successfully co-opted a dandy slogan -- which may have real political consequences for Senate Democrats -- and they also managed to pull the wool over the eyes of a large portion of the mainstream media while doing so. Which, as I said, has to be chalked up as a big political victory for the House Republicans.
The ceremonies are all over and Congress has slunk back into Washington, meaning President Obama's second term can now truly begin. Obama laid out an impressive and optimistic agenda in his speech on Monday, which leads to the question of how much of this agenda will actually be passed into law. Obama faces a Senate with a Democratic edge, but not a filibuster-proof edge. Obama also faces a House with fewer Republicans in it, but still enough for a solid majority. From the viewpoint of the past two years, this seems to indicate that not much of what Obama wants will get done. But perhaps -- just perhaps, mind you -- things will be a little different for the next two years.
Eric Cantor, much to our surprise, almost just did something we not only would have agreed with, but in fact given our wholehearted support to. Almost.
Vice President Joe Biden's office is on a fast track to issue recommendations for reducing gun violence in response to the Newtown school shootings. In terrible incidents like this, the public demand that policymakers "do something" is high; however, too often, a quickly-crafted "solution" creates lasting harm to the very people it seeks to protect, in this instance, the students themselves. This certainly will be the case if special interests like the National Rifle Association (N.R.A.) have their way and we see the number of police in schools begin once again to rise.
President Obama held the last press conference of his first term in office today. He used the opportunity to clearly stake out his position on the looming debt ceiling fight. Obama's position: he's not going to have this fight. Period. Congress can either pass a bill he can sign, or we're going to hit the debt ceiling. Either way, Obama will not treat the debt ceiling as a bargaining chip in the ongoing partisan struggle over the federal budget. Obama will refuse to negotiate over the debt ceiling at all, and is not even entertaining ideas of any sort of "Plan B."