Obama's day: Selling the gun-control plan

It's a day of selling for President Obama, selling his plan to battle gun violence.

The president travels to Minneapolis to visit the city's Police Department Special Operations Center and discuss "his comprehensive set of common-sense ideas to reduce gun violence," the White House schedule says.

Obama's plan includes universal background checks for all gun buyers, a renewal of the assault weapons ban and restrictions on the capacity of ammunition magazines, along with new school safety and mental health programs.

Why Minneapolis?

"Minneapolis is a city that has taken important steps to reduce gun violence and foster a conversation in the community about what further action is needed," the White House says.

That includes a youth violence initiative that has seen some success. In addition, sheriffs in Minnesota have worked to improve the state's background check system on gun purchases.

"President Obama will visit with members of the community about their experiences and discuss additional steps that can be taken at the federal level to reduce gun violence," the schedule says.

Source  http://www.usatoday.com/story/theoval/2013/02/04/obama-minnesota-gun-control-plan/1889971/

Obama Focuses on Status Quo, Not Left, in Battle With G.O.P.

For all the talk that President Obama has shifted leftward, much of his early second-term energy seeks simply to preserve the status quo.

 Mr. Obama’s Inaugural Address last week celebrated the role of “collective action” in creating conditions for a modern economy, expanding individual opportunity and assisting the poor. He rejected Republican arguments that government benefits create “a nation of takers.”

That partisan gibe was telling. He defended two programs, Medicare and Medicaid, begun nearly a half-century ago, and a third, Social Security, that dates from the Great Depression. The federal welfare commitments that Mr. Obama praised in observing that “a great nation must care for the vulnerable” also date back to President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s time.

Yet all those benefits are in the cross-fire of the president’s continuing fiscal battle with Republicans in Congress. That is not because of a shift in philosophy by Mr. Obama or his party, but rather because of the looming cost of the retirements of baby boomers and of the persistent ideological boldness of partisan foes.

Mr. Obama expanded the scope of federal obligations during his first term through short-term stimulus programs and the new health care law. Encouraged by his second popular-vote majority in November and hardened by his confrontations with Republicans over the past two years, he has taken a feistier stance toward his adversaries.

None of the president’s economic initiatives, however, represent a departure for Mr. Obama himself, or for his party. If President Bill Clinton set out to build a “bridge to the 21st century,” said Simon Rosenberg, the president and founder of the New Democrat Network, Mr. Obama is walking across it.

John D. Podesta, an Obama adviser who served as chief of staff in the Clinton White House, called the president’s second-term economic agenda “consistent with where he’s been, consistent with where Clinton was.”

Indeed, since World War II both parties have accepted a substantial measure of federal activism “as American as apple pie,” said Kenneth Baer, a former Obama budget aide.

Mr. Obama’s problem is that postwar America could afford more pie than a post-baby-boomer America will be able to. And in the era of the Tea Party, Republicans have proved increasingly willing to challenge once-settled assumptions about Washington’s role.

In another political moment, Mr. Obama’s attempt to preserve old governing assumptions might be labeled conservative. But Republicans, even after shifting tactics in the wake of a bracing November defeat, say he will have to fight nonstop to advance his agenda.

“His entire second term on fiscal issues is going to be essentially defensive,” said Representative Tom Cole, a veteran Republican from Oklahoma. “He’s trying to defend not just the New Deal legacy, but also Obamacare.”

Mr. Cole added, “The problem he has is, those programs can’t be defended in their current forms.”

But Republicans also have not made their case for the “structural reforms” that they say have been made urgent by trillion-dollar deficits. In fact, they have failed to do so repeatedly.

In the 1990s, Speaker Newt Gingrich’s attempt to rein in Medicare and Medicaid spending helped Mr. Clinton win a second term. President George W. Bush, after adding a prescription drug benefit to Medicare in 2003, could not persuade a Republican Congress to pass his plan for a partial privatization of Social Security.

In last year’s campaign, the Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, and his running mate, Representative Paul D. Ryan, backed a plan to overhaul Medicare through spending limits on each beneficiary. But their plan pushed such savings 10 years into the future, while they attacked Mr. Obama for having cut Medicare spending to help finance the health care law.

When it comes to Republicans pushing for structural changes in benefit programs, “the record there is not good,” said Peter Wehner, a former Bush White House aide. And the Republican argument will not soon get easier to make.

Mr. Obama acknowledges the need for some cuts in entitlement spending, but he campaigned successfully on higher taxes for affluent Americans as an alternative to the deep cuts that Republicans want. By refusing to negotiate this month over raising the nation’s borrowing limit, Mr. Obama forced Republican leaders to set that cudgel aside without accepting the spending cuts they previously insisted on.

To swing rank-and-file Republicans behind that capitulation, House leaders promised that Mr. Ryan’s new budget plan this spring would eliminate the budget deficit within 10 years. Doing so, however, will almost certainly require limiting Medicare spending much sooner than 10 years from now — a step that Mr. Wehner said “I’m not sure I’d recommend,” because it could bring more political pain.

Yet fiscal pressure on the White House will not let up even if Mr. Obama marshals public opinion against that budget. Absent a negotiated deal to reduce spending, Mr. Cole said, Republicans say they will let $1 trillion in 10-year across-the-board budget cuts take effect under the “sequestration” provision both parties agreed to in 2011. That would squeeze defense and domestic government functions alike.

A deal remains possible. In earlier, unsuccessful talks with Republicans, Mr. Obama embraced what Mr. Podesta calls “sensible reforms” to major entitlement programs, including reduced spending for affluent beneficiaries and more modest inflation adjustments.

Not even liberal advocates hold out much hope for new expansions in the government’s economic role, or crackdowns on the United States’ trading partners, or stimulus spending to reduce unemployment — notwithstanding Mr. Obama’s second-inaugural swagger.

Upon hearing Mr. Obama’s address, “I was troubled by the assumption that the economy’s in recovery, when for most Americans the recovery hasn’t started,” said Robert L. Borosage, a co-director of the liberal Campaign for America’s Future.

“He spoke to the progressive coalition,” Mr. Borosage added. But in some ways, he said, the speech “sounded like it came from the Clinton years.” 

Source  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/28/us/politics/obama-seeks-to-keep-status-quo-despite-talk-of-move-to-left.html

Obama expected to nominate chief of staff Lew for Treasury secretary

White House chief of staff Jack Lew is expected to be nominated to replace Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, likely by the end of this week, two sources close to the process told Fox News.

"It is all but a done deal," one of the sources said, adding that it would take something "extraordinary" to pop up in the next couple of days to derail that decision.

Geithner has said for well over a year that he would like to leave the administration and spend more time with his family after a grueling time playing key roles throughout the economic and fiscal unease of recent years. His tenure at the Treasury followed previous service as head of the New York branch of the Federal Reserve.

Lew has become an Obama favorite through several top posts because of his sharp knowledge of the federal budget and no-drama style.

Picking Lew is a sign the president knows his next Treasury secretary will be smack in the middle of a series of budget battles, starting with the debt ceiling fight that will be brewing during the expected confirmation process.

A red flag is that during the last debt ceiling fight, in the summer of 2011, Lew served as White House budget director and clashed repeatedly with Republicans, who may want to get a pound of flesh in confirmation hearings.

In fact, advisers to the president say Lew deliberately kept a low profile during the recent fiscal cliff talks so as not to enflame those tensions on the eve of the expected announcement of his nomination for Treasury.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/01/07/obama-expected-to-nominate-chief-staff-lew-for-treasury-secretary/#ixzz2HNPcCYAP

Obama's Bad Deal and Worse Negotiating

I hate to burst the balloon of a New Year's celebration for an apparently bipartisan deal to avoid the badly misnamed "fiscal cliff," but far from affirming a progressive victory in the 2012 elections, which should have protected the legacy of the New Deal for future generations, the deal permanently bakes in Republican "starve the beast" tax levels that enshrine massive economic inequality and will quickly force President Obama and Congressional Democrats to agree to cuts in benefits for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, student loans, veterans benefits and other social programs that protect the middle class. 

Flush with his election victory, President Obama started the negotiations asking for $1.6 trillion in tax increases over the next decade and promising he would never negotiate over threats to hold the global economy hostage to increasing the debt ceiling. He quickly caved and agreed to $600 billion in tax increases while enshrining a large part of George W. Bush's tax and estate tax cuts permanently into law. 

At the same time, he agreed that the sequester of $1 trillion in spending cuts would be postponed to coincide with the deadline for raising the debt ceiling, transferring his negotiating leverage to Republicans who, despite Obama's protestations to the contrary, will use it to force significant cuts to "entitlements" and social programs for the poor and middle class while protecting the wealth of the top 0.5 percent. 

Obama either proved that he the world's worst poker player, or just as likely, that his campaign promises to protect the poor and middle class were not very serious and he really wants his legacy to be a not very grand bargain that exchanges small increases in taxes on the richest Americans for large cuts to social programs for the poor and middle class. 

This deal to make George W. Bush's "temporary" tax cuts permanent for everyone making less than $450,000 and protecting low taxes on inherited wealth just wasn't necessary. Obama had all the negotiating leverage and he gave it away. If there were no deal now and all the Bush Tax cut automatically expired on all Americans, financial markets would have tanked, and within a week or two, Obama would have forced Congress to fulfill his campaign pledge to raise taxes to Clinton-era levels on everyone making over $250,000 a year. 

By agreeing to move the tax increases only to those making over $250,000 Obama gave away about $200 billion in revenues that could have helped to pay for social programs. In a political vacuum, an argument can be made that's a viable political compromise, particularly since he got temporary extensions to unemployment benefits and tax breaks for the poor in exchange for permanent tax breaks for the rich. 

But by easily compromising on his central campaign promise that he claimed was a line in the sand, Obama signaled to Republicans that there's nothing he won't compromise on. He may say now that he won't negotiate cuts in entitlements and social programs for an increase in the debt ceiling, but there's not a single Republican who will believe him. This January 1 fiscal cliff never posed a long-term danger. But when Republicans took it hostage, Obama caved in on taxes with barely a fight. 

Failing to raise the debt ceiling does pose a long-term danger to the global economy. 

Republicans learned again that when dealing with President Obama, hostage taking works. It will only embolden them to take the debt ceiling hostage again, knowing full well that Obama will cave on his promises to defend Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and other social programs that protect the middle class and the poor.

Source  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/miles-mogulescu/obamas-bad-deal-and-worse_b_2393095.html?utm_hp_ref=politics

Obama’s impact on federal judiciary

It takes a calculator and perhaps the rigor of Sherlock Holmes to cut through the partisan rhetoric about President Obama’s first-term record on judicial nominations. But the bottom line is clear enough.

There are more vacancies on the federal courts now than when Obama took office nearly four years ago. And he is the first president in generations to fail to put a nominee on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, the second most influential court in the land and traditionally a training ground for Supreme Court justices.

Obama has, of course, left his mark on the high court by nominating Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. Their confirmations leave those two seats for decades in liberal hands, and marked a historic diversification of the court.

But, depending on what the Senate does in these final days,Obama’s record on the rest of the federal judiciary will show one more opening on the nation’s powerful 13 courts of appeal than when he took office, and more than a dozen additional vacant district court judgeships.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) blames Senate Republicans for foot-dragging on nominees that he says are utterly uncontroversial.

“These delays mean that the Senate will, again, be needlessly forced to devote the first several months of next year confirming judges who could and should have been confirmed the previous year,” Leahy said earlier this month.

He added that the increase in vacancies “is bad for our federal courts and for the American people who depend on them for justice.”

Sen. Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the committee’s ranking Republican, responds that the Senate has confirmed at least as many as were approved during President George W. Bush’s first term. “The continued complaints we hear about how unfairly this president has been treated are unfounded,” he said.
Russell Wheeler, a judicial scholar at the Brookings Institution, has taken a more detached look at the process. “There is so much propaganda out there,” Wheeler says. “It’s almost as if they are speaking different languages.”

Wheeler’s conclusion: “The contentiousness that affected President William Clinton’s and President George W. Bush’s efforts to appoint judges to the courts of appeals did not appear to worsen during Obama’s first term, but battles have heated up over district nominations.”

Drastically increased delays in confirming district court judges are part of the reason for the higher vacancy rates, Wheeler said, but the Obama administration is responsible for sending up fewer nominees and taking longer to do it.

District judges are at the first tier of the federal judiciary; they decide individual cases and their decisions do not create precedent for other judges. In the past, confirmation of district judges was seen as somewhat routine.

But that has changed, Wheeler said, with longer wait times and more contested votes. The average time from nomination to confirmation for a Clinton district judge was about three months. That grew to 154 days for a Bush nominee, Wheeler said, compared to 223 days for Obama’s choices.

 

 Nominations to the appeals courts are always more controversial. Those judges hear tens of thousands of appeals each year — by comparison, the Supreme Court hears arguments in about 80 — and their judgments become precedent in the states within those circuits.

 Despite some high-profile fights, however, Wheeler found that Obama’s circuit court nominees have fared about as well as those of his predecessors. Or as he put it, “That the Senate has since 1993 denied confirmation to three of every 10 circuit nominees reflects a new (and unfortunate) normal, but at least so far it has not worsened under Obama.”

Obama’s nominees, in fact, have had a shorter path from nomination to confirmation than did Bush’s — 240 days compared to 283 days, according to Wheeler’s calculations.

No court is more contested by either side than the D.C. circuit, for obvious reasons. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Ruth Bader Ginsburg all put in time on the court before being picked for the Supreme Court; Kagan was nominated for the D.C. circuit but was blocked by Senate Republicans.

Even though there are three vacancies on the court — there will be a fourth next year — Obama did not submit a nominee until September 2010. Then, Republicans blocked nominee Caitlin Halligan, general counsel for the New York district attorney’s office, and an additional choice, California law professor Goodwin Liu. Liu has since been appointed to the California Supreme Court, and Obama will try again on Halligan.

Last June, he picked Sri Srinivasan, deputy U.S. solicitor general and a former clerk to retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, for another seat on the court. Srinivasan has not had a Judiciary Committee hearing. (Lest one think it is only Republicans who do the blocking, Senate Democrats ran out the clock the first time Roberts was nominated for the court.)

While liberal groups complain about Republican obstruction, they have also been critical of the White House. The American Prospect recently featured a long piece called “The Courts: How Obama Dropped the Ball.”
But as Wheeler points out, a two-term president almost always has a major impact on the makeup of the federal judiciary.

“Democratic appointees, who in 2009 constituted about a third of active circuit judges, might constitute about two-thirds in 2017,” Wheeler wrote.

Source  http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/obamas-impact-on-federal-judiciary/2012/12/23/68a36518-4b79-11e2-a6a6-aabac85e8036_story_1.html 

Obama offers 'love and prayers' to Newtown, says these tragedies must end

President Obama came to Connecticut on Sunday to express his sorrow for those suffering after the fatal mass shooting of 26 people and to call for an end to such incidents --  offering “the love and hope of a nation” and saying “these tragedies have got to end.”

The president spoke at the Newtown High School after meeting privately with families of the victims and emergency personnel who responded to the deadly shootings Friday inside the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

“I am very mindful that words cannot match the depths of your sorrow,” the president said. “But whatever measure of comfort we can provide, we will provide. … Newtown, you are not alone.”

The president spoke at a lectern, in front of which was table set with 26 glass-covered candles, one for each of the 6- and 7-year-olds fatally shot.

“Surely, we can do better than this,” said Obama in what was his fourth trip as president to a grieving city after a mass shooting. "We must change."

The president vowed during his roughly 18-minute speech that in the coming weeks he will use whatever powers possible to “prevent another tragedy like this” -- including calling upon law enforcement and mental-health experts to help.

A White House official said Obama was the primary author of his speech and edited his remarks on the flight to Connecticut with White House speechwriter Cody Keenan.

The president was introduced by Connecticut Gov. Dan Malloy, who said Obama told him Friday was the hardest day of his presidency.

“We need this … to begin our long journey through grief and loss,” said the Rev. Matt Crebbin, of the Newtown Congressional Church, who began the prayer vigil. “We are all in this together.”

Meanwhile, the grieving town braced itself Monday to bury the first two of the victims and debated when classes could resume -- and where, given the carnage in the building and the children's associations with it.

"We're just now getting ready to talk to our son about who was killed," said Robert Licata, the father of a student who escaped harm during the shooting. "He's not even there yet."

Newtown officials couldn't say whether Sandy Hook Elementary would ever reopen. Monday classes were canceled, and the district was considering eventually sending surviving Sandy Hook students to a former school building in a neighboring town.

Authorities identified the shooter Friday as 20-year-old Adam Lanza. He fatally shot his mother before going to the school and killed himself.

Authorities said Lanza was carrying an arsenal of hundreds of rounds of deadly ammunition -- enough to kill nearly every student in the school if given enough time, raising the chilling notion that the bloodbath could have been even worse. Lanza shot himself in the head when he heard police approaching the classroom where he was gunning down helpless children.

Lanza was described as a bright but painfully awkward student who seemed to have no close friends. 

In high school, he was active in the technology club. The club adviser remembered that he had "some disabilities" and seemed not to feel pain like the other students. That meant Lanza required special supervision when using soldering tools, for instance. 

He also had an occasional "episode" in which he seemed to withdraw completely from his surroundings, the adviser said. Authorities said Lanza had no criminal history, and it was unclear whether he had a job.

Last summer, Obama went to Aurora, Colo., to visit victims and families after a shooting spree at a movie theater in the Denver suburb left 12 dead.

He went to Tucson, Ariz., in January of last year after six people were killed and 13 were wounded, including then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, outside a grocery store. Keenan also helped Obama write that  speech.

In November 2009, Obama traveled to Fort Hood, Texas, to speak at the memorial service for 13 service members who were killed on the post by another soldier.

After the Colorado shooting in July, the White House made clear that Obama would not propose new gun restrictions in an election year and said he favored better enforcement of existing laws.

However, the Connecticut shootings may have changed the political dynamic in Washington, although public opinion in favor of gun control has declined over the years. While the White House has said Obama stands by his desire to reinstate a ban on military-style assault weapons, he has not pushed Congress to act.

Several Democratic lawmakers, during appearances on the Sunday talk shows, said the gruesome killings at the school were the final straw in a debate on gun laws that has fallen to the wayside in recent years.

"This conversation has been dominated in Washington by -- you know and I know -- gun lobbies that have an agenda" said Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate. "We need people, just ordinary Americans, to come together, and speak out, and to sit down and calmly reflect on how far we go."

Sen. Joe Lieberman, a Connecticut independent who is retiring, suggested a national commission on mass violence that would examine gun laws and what critics see as loopholes, as well as the mental health system and violence in movies and video games. Durbin said he supports the idea, and would add school safety to the list of topics to examine.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said she would push legislation next year to ban future sales of military-assault weapons like those used in the elementary school shooting. The bill will ban big clips, drums and strips of more than 10 bullets.

Gun rights activists remained largely quiet on the issue, all but one declining to appear on the talk shows. However, Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, defended the sale of assault weapons and said that the principal at Sandy Hook Elementary School, who authorities say died trying to overtake the shooter, should herself have been armed.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/12/17/president-obama-leads-interfaith-prayer-vigil-in-newtown-conn/#ixzz2FIgvmEj3

Obama Bets Re-Election Gave Him Power to Win Fiscal Cliff

President Barack Obama’s hard stance on the “fiscal cliff” talks is a bet that his re-election gave him the political clout to force Republicans to accept higher taxes on upper income Americans as a first step toward reducing the federal deficit. 

Obama’s aggressive posture was shown in the proposal Timothy F. Geithner laid out for congressional leaders last week: a reprise of the president’s prior budget proposals, with $1.6 trillion in tax increases and about $350 billion in health care savings, primarily in Medicare. He also asked for an Aug. 1 deadline for decisions on income tax overhaul and further spending cuts.

“You could see the shock in the Republicans -- this is not what they were expecting from the White House,” said Stan Collender, managing director of Qorvis Communications LLC in Washington and a former staff member for the House and Senate budget committees. “There was almost euphoria among Democrats that the president was playing hardball.”

The two parties are in stalemate over what spending cuts and revenue increases should be approved to cut a budget deficit that’s exceeded $1 trillion for each of the four years Obama’s been in office. The administration says no agreement is possible unless Republicans agree to increase tax rates for the highest earning Americans, a stance underscored by Geithner in a sweep of the Sunday talk shows. Republicans oppose any tax rate increase and demand deeper cuts than Obama has offered, a line that House Speaker John Boehner drew on one show yesterday.

No Compromises

Both administration officials and congressional Republicans say they want a deal before year’s end -- without either side publicly offering any compromises.

“There’s not going to be an agreement without rates going up,” Geithner said in a taped interview that aired yesterday on CNN’s “State of the Union” program. Republicans will “own the responsibility for the damage” if they “force higher rates on virtually all Americans because they’re unwilling to let tax rates go up on 2 percent of Americans.”

Obama wants to boost top income-tax rates back to the levels they were when President Bill Clinton left office. The top rate then was 39.6 percent, compared with 35 percent today.
Boehner said Republicans aren’t ready to give in, and the president should take the lead by offering concessions.

House Majority

“They must have forgotten that Republicans continue to hold a majority in the House,” Boehner, an Ohio Republican, said on “Fox News Sunday.” “The president’s idea of a negotiation is ‘roll over and do what I ask.’ We need to find common ground, and we need to find it quickly.”

Collender puts the odds of failure at 60 percent, as both sides need to prove their mettle to core supporters.
The risk for Obama is that Republicans will match his brinkmanship and no deal will be reached. The result would be the “fiscal cliff,” the more than $600 billion in automatic spending cuts and tax increases that start kicking in automatically at the beginning of the new year.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said in an August report said the tax increases and spending cuts would shrink economic output next year by 0.5 percent and push the unemployment rate to about 9 percent.

Moody’s Investors Service said in September it may join Standard & Poor’s in downgrading the U.S.’s credit rating unless the president and Congress reduce the percentage of debt to gross domestic product.

Markets React

Stocks have been whipsawed since the election as Obama and Boehner dueled in public.
The benchmark Standard & Poor’s 500 Index (SPX) increased 0.5 percent to 1,416.18 last week and it extended its rally since Nov. 16 to 4.1 percent. The Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced 15.90 points, or 0.1 percent, to 13,025.58.

The bond market hasn’t demonstrated the same level of concern. While total national debt has soared to more than $16 trillion from less than $9 trillion in 2007, U.S. borrowing costs have tumbled. The yield on the 10-year note touched a record low 1.379 percent July 25, down from more than 5 percent in mid-2007.
Obama’s strategy is borne, in part, out of lessons Obama and his advisers take from the failed 2011 attempt to reach a grand bargain on long-term debt reduction.

Obama and Boehner tried to forge a compromise in private talks. Instead of clearing the path, their effort collapsed and served to increase resistance among members of both parties in Congress.

Source  http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-12-03/obama-bets-re-election-gave-him-power-to-win-fiscal-cliff