unveil the results of their 22-month investigation this afternoon. politico s congress bureau chief martin kady joins us. good to see you. this is a big deal. they spent almost two years investigating senator ensign. why do you think that senator boxer wants to talk about on the senate floor? i mean, this is really interesting. because usually you think the ethics committee acts in such secrecy. don t even talk about whether they re doing an investigation. now ensign has resigned, because he was afraid of what the ethics committee would come up with, and they re still going to take the findings to the senate floor. we don t know what they re going to say, we don t know how much they have. and boxer hasn t yet given a public explanation about why she is deciding to reveal this on the senate floor. but there was a joint announcement from johnnie isaacson, the top republican member there, so they re going to reveal these findings. we don t know how salacious this is going to be, damagin
so that was a little bit of a weird moment in this whole scandal that created a higher level of legal investigation. right. and we know that ensign resigned abruptly to hopefully stop the release of the findings of this investigation. so we will wait and see. martin kady, good to see you, thank you so much. thank you. arizona republican john mccain on the senate floor today insisted enhanced interrogation techniques did not lead to the killing of osama bin laden. mccain was a p.o.w. for more than five years, and, of course, is an outspoken voice against harsh interrogations. senator harry reid later said the mccain speech will be, quote, forever remembered in our country. to defeat our enemies, we need intelligence. but intelligence that is reliable. we should not torture or trade inhumanly terrorists we have captured. i believe the abuse of prisoners harms, not helps, our war
but what else the president didn t lay out anything on medicare, social security, and didn t lay out what specific defense cuts he wants. well, the issue is what constitutes a plan? i think the white house believes what they laid out is a plan. some will say, well, it s philosophical. either way, he also said well i m mandated joe biden to be the guy to cut the deal in the room. so i think some of it has to do with that. the other part of this, i know some of this is public relations. and they want to make sure that, you know, look, he s willing to talk to both sides. he s going to do the same thing with the caucuses, bring over the house democrats whoç are n happy, no matter what, they re going to have a bitter pill to swallow and house republicans probably a much more contentious meeting. we have already seen a report, senator mcconnell said it was candid. senate republicans aren t his problem. the problem for the president in getting anything done is house republican
stuff, and it s a sign that nancy pelosi s power has definitely faded in this new congress. she still has the power to raise hell when she wants to. for instance, according to politico s reporting, gene sperling at a private meeting about the outlines of the budget. she didn t like the fact that she felt that congress wasn t consulted. what happened there? yeah, well, i mean, this deal came together between the senate majority leader, harry reid, the president and john boehner. they were afraid, a lot of folks were afraid that if pelosi got in the room, she would push the deal to the left, driven republicans away from the table and that s what our reporting shows. and you make a good point. nancy pelosi remains very powerful behind closed doors with democrats. she is a heck of a fund-raiser. she still is into the minority leader of the democratic caucus, just as a public figure, still a little toxic for democrats. and raising hell with the white house. yeah. thank you, mart
speech yesterday. that s what we believe. how do you have a serious debate about this? this coming from the president? the budget battle is already the top issue for the 2012 campaign. and want tonight, the presidents back to chicago to kick off his own money chase. three re-election fund-raisers tonight alone toward an eventual $1 billion goal. and in new hampshire today, the first primary state is host for a magnet of republican wannabes. five potential 2012 contenders hitting the ground. economic adviser gene sperling. from the senate, marco rubio. and republican senator john barrasso and pat toomey saying ryan s plan doesn t go far enough. and we ll get a sneak peek at what senator toomey is proposing, next. and caught in a cat nap? what was vice president biden dreaming about during the president s speech yesterday? good day, i m andrea mitchell live in washington. a few minutes from now, president obama will be heading to chicago to start raising money for his own