Obama: "No reason" we cannot avoid sequestration
At a ceremony honoring departing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta today, President Obama said there is "no reason" we cannot avoid the automatic defense cuts contained in the so-called sequester, cuts that he said will have a "severe impact on our military preparedness."
"Since we are just weeks away from deep automatic cuts to federal spending, including defense, let me say this: there is no reason - no reason - for that to happen."
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Obama to honor slain Newtown teachers with medal
President Obama will honor the memory of six teachers killed in the massacre in Newtown by presenting them posthumously with the Presidential Citizens Medal, the nation's second-highest civilian honor, the White House announced today.
The teachers - Dawn Hochsprung, Rachel Davino, Anne Marie Murphy, Lauren Rousseau, Mary Sherlach, and Victoria Soto - were gunned down while protecting the children of Sandy Hook Elementary School from a massacre on December 14, 2012.
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Bill Clinton warns Dems, "Nothing is permanent"
Former President Bill Clinton told an enthusiastic audience of House Democrats on Friday that they "have a real chance to do some phenomenally creative and effective things" after the results of the 2012 election. But he cautioned them against becoming cocksure, warning, "You have to understand about politics, nothing is permanent. It is an ongoing enterprise."
"We should not rely on demography alone," Clinton warned, casting doubt on hopes, expressed by some Democrats, that America's increasing diversity would permanently tilt the electorate in their direction.
Instead, Clinton advised Democrats to continue reaching out: "We should not give up on our ability...to begin a conversation with people who are not as extreme as a lot of the candidates they voted for in the Republican Party."
"It's important not to give up on anybody, to talk to them," he said.
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Energy Secretary embraces Onion satire
Energy Secretary Steven Chu, the subject of a satirical article that suggested he was involved in a drunken romp with a solar panel, chose to play along with the joke.
The Onion article described a "hungover" Chu who "awoke on Thursday morning to find himself sleeping next to a giant solar panel he had met the previous evening."
"'Oh, Christ, what the hell did I do last night?'," Chu asked himself, according to The Onion. "'This is bad. I really need to stop doing this. I've got to get this thing out of here before my wife gets home."
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Obama pleads for unity at National Prayer Breakfast
Continuing a tradition started by Dwight Eisenhower in 1953, President Obama attended the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C. today, delivering a plea for unity and humility and rebuking the often-fractious tone of American politics.
Mr. Obama recalled placing his hand on Abraham Lincoln's bible during his second inauguration two weeks ago and noted, "Today, the divisions in this country are thankfully not as deep and destructive as when Lincoln led - but they are real."
Praising Lincoln's capacity to "see God in those who vehemently opposed him," the president counseled his audience to follow Lincoln's example. "In a democracy as big and as diverse as ours, we will encounter every opinion. And our task as citizens, whether we are leaders in government or business or spreading the word, is to spend our days with open hearts and open minds, to seek out the truth that exists in an opposing view, to find the common ground that allows for us as a nation and as a people to take real and meaningful action."
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Rubio to deliver State of the Union response
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., has been selected to deliver the Republican Party's response to President Obama's State of the Union address Tuesday night, congressional GOP leaders announced today.
The selection marks another milestone in Rubio's rapid rise among national Republicans. The Cuban-American senator, who first arrived on Capitol Hill after the GOP landslide of 2010, is a favorite among the tea party who commonly tops conservatives' 2016 presidential candidate wish lists.
In announcing the selection, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, praised Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, as "one of our party's most dynamic and inspiring leaders" whose family story "is a testament to the promise and greatness of America."
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Two House Dems on recreational pot: Legalize it
When voters in Colorado and Washington state voted to legalize marijuana for recreational use last November, some wondered how the new statewide statutes would square with federal law, which still classifies marijuana as an illegal drug under the Controlled Substances Act.
But Rep. Jared Polis, D-Col., believes that a legal confrontation can be avoided: on Tuesday, along with Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., he introduced a bill legalizing marijuana and regulating it under the renamed Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Marijuana, and Firearms.
The "Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act" would charge the renamed bureau with regulating marijuana as it does alcohol and tobacco. States would still be allowed to ban marijuana production and it would remain illegal to transport marijuana to a state where such a ban exists.
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Harkin, Iowa State University caught in feud
Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, has cut ties with an institute bearing his name at Iowa State University amid questions about the institute's fundraising and a dispute over the scope of the institute's research.
Harkin, a near 40-year veteran of Capitol Hill who will retire when his current term elapses in 2015, announced on Tuesday evening that he would not donate papers documenting his congressional career to the Harkin Institute of Public Policy at Iowa State, his alma mater. Harkin, who had previously agreed to donate his papers to the institute, argued that doubts about the institute's academic freedom had caused him to change his mind.
"I regret that this did not work out as we had all hoped at the beginning," Harkin said.
The problems began when Harkin, who has played a key role in agricultural policymaking during his long career in Congress, discovered a memorandum barring the institute from studying agriculture last summer.
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Obama: "Yes," Boy Scouts should allow gays
President Obama responded with a simple "Yes" when he was asked on Sunday by CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley whether the Boy Scouts of America should open their organization to openly gay members.
His reason? "My attitude is that gays and lesbians should have access and opportunity the same way everybody else does, in every institution and walk of life."
"The Scouts are a great institution that are promoting young people and exposing them to opportunities and leadership that will serve people for the rest of their lives," Mr. Obama continued, "And I think nobody should be barred from that."
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Panetta: Enhanced interrogation not necessary
Outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Sunday that "We could have gotten bin Laden without" enhanced interrogation techniques, despite the implication in the film "Zero Dark Thirty" that the techniques, called torture by opponents, played a pivotal role in finding bin Laden.
"First of all, it's a movie," Panetta said on NBC's "Meet the Press". "Let's remember that."
Saying he "lived the real story," Panetta added that "in order to put the puzzle of intelligence together that led us to bin Laden, there was a lot of intelligence. There were a lot of pieces out there that were part of that puzzle."
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Nebraska Lt. Gov. resigns after phone scandal
Lt. Gov. Rick Sheehy, R-Neb., resigned Saturday after the disclosure of thousands of "late night telephone calls" Sheehy placed to four women, none of whom were his wife, during the last four years.
His resignation was announced at a morning press conference by Gov. Dave Heinemann, also a Republican, who said that Sheehy had broken "the public trust."
"As public officials, we are rightly held to a higher standard," Heinema said. "I had trusted him, and that trust was broken."
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WH releases photo of Obama skeet shooting
When President Obama said in a recent interview that he goes skeet shooting "all the time" at Camp David, some wondered why he never disclosed this nugget before and why nobody has seen evidence of his riflery.
"How often does the president go skeet shooting, and are there photographs of him doing so?" a reporter asked White House press secretary Jay Carney the day after the president's remarks on skeet shooting.
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GOP: "Pass a budget or you don't get paid"
For the third time in as many weeks, Republicans used their weekly address Saturday to slam Senate Democrats for not passing a budget in four years, touting a proposal that would withhold lawmakers' paychecks until they pass a budget and accusing Democrats of "a failure to lead."
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Biden meets with German Chancellor Merkel
Kicking off his first overseas trip during his second term, Vice President Joe Biden met with German Chancellor Angela Merkel today in Berlin and hailed Germany as "an absolutely essential, critical partner."
"It's a delight to be back in Germany," Biden said, joking that "The president, since I'm vice president, sends me mostly to Afghanistan and Iraq."
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Poll: Government viewed as a threat to freedom
At the outset of President Obama's second term, he sits atop a government that a majority of Americans - 53 percent - view as a threat to personal rights and freedoms, according to a new poll from the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.
In March 2010, only 47 percent of respondents felt that the government threatened their freedom. The increase since then has been driven largely by Republicans - in 2010, only 62 percent of conservative Republicans described the government as a threat, but today, 76 percent of conservative Republicans feel threatened by the state.
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