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The White House issued a "fact sheet" statement Tuesday declaring the fiscal cliff agreement a victory, though the House has yet to vote on the measure. "At this make or break moment for the middle class, the President achieved a bipartisan solution that keeps income taxes low for the middle class and grows the economy," the statement says. "For the first time in 20 years, Congress will have acted on a bipartisan basis to vote for significant new revenue.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Monday night that she will present the fiscal cliff deal to House Democrats as soon as it’s approved by the upper chamber. “I understand at the present time, Senate Democrats are meeting with the Vice President,” Pelosi said in a statement. “When a final agreement is reached and passed by the Senate, I will present it to the House Democratic Caucus.”

The one thing I am always afraid of in budget negotiations is that virtually nothing is done, or worse yet, something counterproductive is done. Obama's latest Fiscal Cliff "Mini-Deal" Proposal is exactly the kind of counterproductive nonsense I am talking about. Assuming the above Atlantic Wire article is correct ...   The deal would delay or replace the vast majority of spending cuts called for in the automatic sequester. The deal would extend unemployment benefits The deal would stop planned cuts to Medicare reimbursements Out of the blue, and probably an attempt to buy farm-state votes, the deal purportedly would include...

Warren Buffett says he’s optimistic the nation’s debt problems will be solved, despite the political fighting that’s threatening to put the country over the “fiscal cliff.” … “The United States is richer than it’s ever been. We have $50,000 or so of GDP per person. But we’ve overpromised and we’ve also under taxed to some extent, so we find ourselves with this great fiscal imbalance. But it was man made. We’re a rich country. It can be solved. … We’ll be able to overcome this problem. America has faced a lot tougher problems than this one. We’ll get it solved.”...

Looks like John Boehner may get his wish. After his Plan B collapsed, Boehner has insisted that the ball is in the Senate’s court, as the House has already passed legislation that would resolve the fiscal cliff. The Hill reports that Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell are now working on a plan that they will reveal sometime tomorrow — as the eleventh hour ticks away: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) are working on an agreement to avoid across-the-board tax hikes and plan to show it to colleagues Sunday.Senate leaders emerged optimistic from a...

One of the more hysterical components of the fiscal cliff saga is watching the Democrats falling all over themselves to champion the importance of preserving the existing tax rates – the George W. Bush Tax Rates – for nearly every American taxpayer.  The President last offer to Speaker Boehner would preserve the Bush Tax Rates for at least 99.5% of all taxpayers according to IRS data (all but individuals above $400,000 annual income). To be clear, there's nothing funny about the fiscal mess that our nation is in.  It's real.  It's serious.  And, if Washington fails to get its act...

Senate leaders Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell agreed Friday to work through the weekend to develop a possible fiscal-cliff plan they hope could pass in both chambers of Congress before Dec. 31. The eleventh-hour effort was the upshot of an hour-long discussion at the White House among congressional leaders and President Obama. Speaker John Boehner told the group that the House, which is scheduled to return to work Sunday night, will act only after the Senate makes the next move. Should Congress fail to ratify legislation in time for Obama to sign it before midnight Monday, more than $500 billion...

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.)—author of the federal “assault weapon” and “large” ammunition magazine ban of 1994-2004—has announced that on the first day of the new Congress—January 3rd— she will introduce a bill to which her 1994 ban will pale by comparison. On Dec. 17th, Feinstein said, “I have been working with my staff for over a year on this legislation” and “It will be carefully focused.” Indicating the depth of her research on the issue, she said on Dec. 21st that she had personally looked at pictures of guns in 1993, and again in 2012. According to a Dec. 27th...

Editor's Note: This column was coauthored by Bob Morrison. The editorial staff of the Washington Post, surely meant well. They wanted readers to think that Sen. John Kerry’s vast experience in foreign policy over four decades equips him to serve as Secretary of State in the second Obama administration. The editorial, titled “John Kerry: Well-suited to be Secretary of State,” gets that part right. The natty Mr. Kerry certainly looks the part of a globe-trotting senior U.S. diplomat. As to his qualifications for that role, we’re reminded of Frederick the Great’s response when he was urged to make a less...

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.)—author of the federal “assault weapon” and “large” ammunition magazine ban of 1994-2004—has announced that on the first day of the new Congress—January 3rd— she will introduce a bill to which her 1994 ban will pale by comparison. On Dec. 17th, Feinstein said, “I have been working with my staff for over a year on this legislation” and “It will be carefully focused.” Indicating the depth of her research on the issue, she said on Dec. 21st that she had personally looked at pictures of guns in 1993, and again in 2012. According to a Dec. 27th...

News reports say that Reid and McConnell are going to work through the weekend to try ad reach a deal. House members have been called back to the Capitol,and the House is scheduled to meet Sunday evening. All this is designed to possibly get a bull that Obama can sign Monday morning, in order to avoid going over the fiscal cliff. But there's just one small problem, which nobody's talking about.. the House rule that mandates that no legislation can be passed until three days have passed, to allow for representatives, and the public, to read, understand, and comment on...

Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should testify before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya, to “explain why her department failed.” In an editorial published on Wednesday, Rubio said the State Department Accountability Review Board (ARB) report released last week “concisely lays out much that we already knew” about the attack that killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens. “This was the premeditated work of terrorists, not a protest about a YouTube video that spun out of control,” Rubio said, adding that...

Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) told a crowd gathered outside the U.S. Capitol on Friday that House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has given “veto power to the most extreme members of the Tea Party caucus.” Van Hollen called on the House to vote on a Senate measure that would raise taxes on individuals making more than $200,000 in order to avoid the fiscal cliff. The Democrat claimed that the Republican Boehner will not call for the vote because of the Tea Party caucus …

A new petition posted on the “We the People” page of the White House website calls for trying Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif) in federal court for treason. … The petition is a response to Senator Feinstein’s proposed legislation that seeks “to stop the sale, transfer, importation and manufacturing of military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition feeding devices.” …

Cliff Deal Hinges on Senators White House Meeting Ends With Expressions of Cautious Optimism From Both Sides on Negotiations By JANET HOOK and CAROL E. LEE WASHINGTON—The job of averting year-end tax increases and spending cuts landed squarely on the Senate, whose leaders said Friday they would launch a last-ditch weekend effort to avert the so-called fiscal cliff. President Barack Obama met with all four congressional leaders in an hourlong meeting in the Oval Office to review an increasingly narrow range of options. He later said he was "modestly optimistic" a deal could be reached, echoing comments from the top...

So how did the last-ditch fiscal cliff meeting go this afternoon? Not great. President Obama again put forth the scaled-back version of the proposal he pitched last week. A source familiar with the meeting told CNBC that Obama was not making a new offer; just laying out what he thinks can pass the House and Senate. That includes keeping the tax cut for those making up to $250,000 and an extension of unemployment insurance for 2 million people. He will then ask the participants what they are willing to support, and if they don't have a counterproposal that can pass the...

President Barack Obama issued an executive order to end the pay freeze on federal employees, in effect giving some federal workers a raise. One federal worker now to receive a pay increase is Vice President Joe Biden. According to disclosure forms, Biden made a cool $225,521 last year. After the pay increase, he'll now make $231,900 per year. Members of Congress, from the House and Senate, also will receive a little bump, as their annual salary will go from $174,000 to 174,900. Leadership in Congress, including the speaker of the House, will likewise get an increase.

“The American people are watching what we do here. Obviously, their patience is already thin. It’s déjà vu all over again,” Obama added. “The American people are not going to have any patience for a politically self inflicted wound to our economy.”

Congressional leaders spoke Friday after meeting about the fiscal cliff with President Barack Obama at the White House. -snip- McConnell spoke immediately after Reid, saying, “I share the view of the majority leader. We had a good meeting down at the White House. “We are engaged in discussions, the majority leader and myself and the White House, in the hopes that we can come forward as early as Sunday and have a recommendation that I can make to my conference and the majority leader [Reid] can make to his conference and so we’ll be working hard to try and see...

Dow Futures Live As on 28-Dec-2012 18:15:18 EDT 12,777 -226.00 -1.77%