Confrontational across the board. I dont expect to see much of a change on that. On one issue even though proposing new initiatives that will cost money, not massive new stimulus, but he will make what white house officials are describing as a progressive case for deficit reduction, that that still needs to be done even entitlement reform, and the progressive case is if these programs continue to grow out of control, they crowd out other initiatives, other priorities that are, you know, that progressives hold dear on education, on infrastructure, you know, social programs. Well, one of the other things well see, congressman ellison, you and several other members of the Democratic Caucus will bring guests into the chamber victims of gun violence. Thats right. As a matter of fact, young man named semi rahiman, who lost his father in a tragic event in minneapolis will join me and jim langua languagevin and our colleagues, about 30 members who are inviting victims of gun violence to be in the gallery looking forward to them being with us because they theyre witnesses to the need for sane, sensible reform in the area of gun violence prevention. Congressman cole, whats your sense of what can get done on that this year . Gabby giffords will also be in the hall also on tuesday. It seems to me reading the tea leaves, that some kind of consensus is building around universal background checks with the assault weapons ban likely to go nowhere. In the assault weapon ban, youre absolutely correct. Look, it starts in the senate and well see what harry reid can get done. Most of the key players, nra ratings including the majority leader, chairman leahy, six democrats up in states that the president got 42 or less in. I dont think theyll be too enamored with him, so i think that pushes you toward things like background checks and the house, its going to be tougher. I mean thats just the reality of it politically. So i would expect something to be done. I think theres going to be a lot of hearings but probably more in the Mental Health area, potentially in some of the background check areas, but anything that hints towards national regs wont make it and anything that really materially makes it more difficult for people to exercise Second Amendment rights wont happen. I tell you, i dont agree. I hope that i think the odds of something happening are determined by the determination of people who push those things. And when the folks are going to be joining me and jim langevin, we dont want to take the rights of owning a gun away. I own a gun myself, but i do believe when you have 20 dead first graders, we need action in this country and im most nra members agree. Let me bring in Stephanie Cutter. Where the president puts emphasis on tuesday night, i heard jon karl say, i think thats right, big focus on jobs. One thing you are seeing is president obamas Approval Rating coming in at 52 . That has if about where thats welcome back president bush had it his second term. President clinton below. How do you have him handle the rest . He will do what he has been doing. You use the word confrontational. I would use a different word. They will be very familiar themes. The economy will be central and how we can grow it. So everybody can participate. Fair shot, pay your fair share but other things that he does lay out, hell lay out the looming deadline on the sequester and tough choices we have to make around it and consequences if we let the sequester go into effect and, you know, cuts to some pretty critical programs, so i think the state of the union is always an important moment in a presidency, not just another case for the people sitting in the room but the country of the tough choices we have to make and i think hell make it. Nicolle, a cautionary tale on the state of the union. I think that he made the proposal to reform Social Security without having his own party on board. Thats a lesson for any president , but i think president obama did the Republican Party a huge favor by delivering an inaugural address that was historically combative. He did not deliver the kind of inaugural address people are accustomed to in recent history. Instead he came out in a really spirited way, i wouldnt call them fighting words, but spirited defense of an aggressive progressive agenda. Im told by staffers from marco rubios office that he had a certain kind of response to the state of the union in mind, he tore it up and started again. Republicans now are ready to i think go toe to toe with a very spirited president who i think is ready to advance a progressive agenda. I think this will help republicans really, you know, match spirit with spirit and make a conservative case. You know, marco rubios response, you know, the expectation for some of this, a chance for him to showcase his immigration plan but im told rubios response touches very little on immigration. This will be a very confrontational speech taking on the president. It will touch on immigration but it is not immigration speech. The same things that you describe there, hell talk about the middle class and talk about same things you talked about how to bring opportunity to every corner of the country so i think it will be a battle of ideas. Which is great and what it should be. I just want to take one note on the inaugural address. You know, it has been described as a speech with a list of progressive ideas, but if you actually look at what the president talked about, thats not progressive, thats actually the center of the country right now, whether its gay marriage or climate change. Immigration, youve seen how far weve been able to move the immigration debate. Thats where the country is, and i think as republicans are trying to remake themselves and points, they need to realize where the country is. Where the country is but one thing weve seen in those issues like guns and immigration, climate change, very low on peoples priorities now, economy front and center. Thats what the president is going to be focused on. You all mentioned the sequester that is coming up, as well. I want to dig into that a little bit. It seemed like when the sequester was proposed back in 2011, it was proposed because no one wanted or expected it to happen. Take a look. The whole idea of the sequester was to make sure that both sides felt obligated to move off rigid positions. The sequester is ugly, it was designed to be ugly because we didnt want anybody to go there. The very idea of those automatic cuts is that they are so unacceptable, that few of us will want to see them enacted, and most of us will be willing to compromise in order to avoid them. What a difference a year makes. Congressman cole, its gone from irresponsible to what seems like inevitable. I think it is inevitable, quite frankly. But for the president this was a president ial suggestion back in 2011, an idea and yet the president himself hasnt put out any alternative. Republicans twice in the house have passed legislation to deal with it, once as early as last may, again, after the election in december and the senate never picked up either bill, never offered their own thing. Now were at three weeks out and folks are worried. They ought to be worried. On the other hand, these cuts are going to occur. Now, the real choice here is simply do you want cuts to be redistributed in other ways, which is the sensible thing to do or do you want to let this happen . I think republicans are quite prepared to negotiate on redistributing cuts. Youre saying all cuts. Republicans are look, absolutely none. The president accepted no spending cuts back in the fiscal cliff deal 45 days ago. So you get all no spending cuts back then. Then youre going to get no revenue now. Well, tom, the problem with saying this is the president s idea is that you voted for the budget control act. I voted against it. We wouldnt have ever been talking about the budget control act but for your party refused to negotiate on the debt ceiling something that has been routinely increased as the country needed it. You use that occasion that is not the case. You used that occasion in 2011, august to basically say, we are going to let were going to default on the countrys obligation or youll give us dramatic spending cuts. Thats how we got to the budget control ago. Let me tell you, the bottom line is this sequester will put a Million People out of work, no, 600,000, excuse me, got to get my numbers right, 600,000 people out of work, and this is going to increase unemployment, its going to increase the deficit because people paying taxes means that were lowering the deficit. Its going to do its going to do everything opposite to what your party says that they want. Its going to create uncertainty, its going to increase the deficit. Its going to increase unemployment. Thats why we put out proposals to deal with its going to be a problem. Deal with the key we dont have a president ial proposal. We dont even have a proposal from the president. You got a proposal from the caucus. Let me tell you about the ballots again. I dont think you speak for the president , so lets see. Jon karl, take that up, the question. President has given a couple of speeches where he wants a balanced approach, but no linebyline proposal on the table right now. Yeah, and theres been internal debate in the white house on this. I got to tell you at the white house they seem like there will be eventually will be a compromise to avert the cuts. Not before not before march 1st. The pressure comes, negative consequences, i see zero chance of a deal on this. I dont see any chance and republicans did a great job of saying this was the president s idea, they appointed bob and clear the president s idea, but i talked to republicans and not just the radical house guys but prominent republican senator this week told me that he loves the sequester because its actually real cuts. I want to bring that to nicolle wallace. I think thats a widespread sentiment. On the other hand, hear from the white house and democratic operatives that may say thats all well and good but republicans will get blamed. The country is pretty strongly in support of big cuts, of bloated federal government and i think if you take it to the whole country, that would include the defense budget. I think that no one is interested in cutting anything that would impede our military readiness. No one wants to take anything at all from any of our troops on the front lines but to say that in the entire pentagon budget there isnt an iota of room for cuts like this for meaningful cuts would be lying. This is significant. You have republicans saying the pentagon budget can be cut without jeopardizing National Security. Not all of them. You have people like john mccain describe the fall but a lot of republicans, privately and publicly, saying that there is room to cut the as long as you dont as long as you hold harmless with everything that deals with troop readiness, that deals with troops on the front lines and military families but theres plenty of room in the procurement budgets, theres plenty of room for reforms and for i want to come to that in a second, but the problem will be, i think for the white house, broadly and for the country is the point that congressman ellison makes, you hit the sequester right now, that is goign to have a real Economic Impact right away. Absolutely, absolutely, and i think youll hear the president most likely talk about that on tuesday night, tuesday night. We cant have any more selfinflicted wounds on the economy. The economy is poised to take off. If we do the right things. Having massive acrosstheboard cuts to some critical programs i mean youre talking about education, health care, that things that actually we need, cops, to make this the economy grow. A couple of things, one, the president does have a plan on the table, fortunately deficit Reduction Plan thats been on the table for almost two years, balanced deficit reduction and cut 2 trillion out of the budget, balanced revenue and entitlement reform. Thats on the table, its been on the table. Number two, where the country is, like, the country believes we need to do something about deficit reform. If you look at the exit polls from the last election, upwards of 60 people coming out voting for the president , voting generally. Things that we need to reduce our deficit and in a balanced way. Balanced means everybody pays their fair share. That includes revenue and right now its 31 in terms of cuts that its not exactly where the republicans were six weeks ago, taxes were going up by law. The only question were you going to negotiate a good package, save as many bush tax cuts as you could. We eventually got there with no cuts from the president. Now these cuts are coming by law and its law that the president signed and advocated, and hes put no real proposal on the table with all due respect, and the reality is the cuts are going to come. Now, well sit down and renegotiate where theyre going to come from. We think we can do a lot better job can we just mechanism meant to be an enforcement mechanicism. The fiscal cliff on new years day, youd have highincome people who already have a lot of Discretionary Income seeing taxes go up. Thats not going to hurt the economy. This thing is going to put 600,000 people out of work talking cops, were talking teachers, pink slips will be going out. Were calling that [ all talking at once ] this is why we need to negotiate this thing and not just say its going to be sequester or our way. We actually passed come on. Legislation how many did you not many. Remember why we did this in the first place. We did this not because we wanted the cuts to go in place. Nobody wanted these cuts to go in place. This was an enforcement mechanism for congress to come together, finally come together to pass deficit reform, deficit reduction. These acrosstheboard cuts is not going to get us there because its going to strangle our economy, slow growth which will increase the deficit and the choices that people are making here are acrosstheboard cuts, which could be 10,000 teachers or asking Oil Companies to pay their fair share. Thats what the victims of the sequester, its so funny to hear democrats cry about the sequester. Democrats control the executive branch, they control the senate and theyre in a position to negotiate with republicans who have put out two packages of alternative cuts so take those well in the senate in response. Thats not take it or leave it. Thats like the process. They havent been able to pass anything, the president hasnt proposed anything with three weeks away. We acted in may of last year. We acted again in december. Senator reid is not saying he will pass a budget out of the senate this year. But i want to bring this back to jon karl because when you look at the sequester coming in on march 1st, it seems like even the bigger hammer is 3 1 2 weeks later march 27th, the entire government runs out of money. The last time they shut down was 1995 and did backfire on the house republicans. Yeah, we faced a Government Shutdown and not long after that had to deal with the debt ceiling yet again, so it seems to me the real battle like i said, theres zero chance the sequester deal will happen before march 1st. Those automatic spending cuts will go in effect and you will start seeing notices on furloughing employees and be on notice they may be furloughed but the real battle over the funding of the government and a chance for those automatic cuts to be rejiggered. One of the things youre seeing right now, and this is against the backdrop of the Republican Party coming out of the last election talking about where theyll go in the future and how theyll be seen by the public and you guys mentioned marco rubio on the cover of Time Magazine called right there the republican savior put out a tweet saying theres only one savior here, and its not me and a lot of pressure on marco rubio. Youve seen several coming out with speeches where the party should be. Weve got to stop being the stupid party. Im serious. Time for a new Republican Party that talks like adults. I would argue that a more restrained Foreign Policy is the true conservative Foreign Policy. The average american is not thinking about and trying to wonder about where the Republican Party is. Theyre thinking about how to make their life work. Your leader in the house right there, eric cantor, where is this debate headed . I think its a good debate for the Republican Party to have. When you lose an election, you ought to be a little bit reflective and ought to think back and ought to begin to say, what do we need to do differently . We didnt do badly in the election, but the president won with less than he was elected in 08, lower popular vote, lower electoral vote. We held the house, we have 30 governors. The idea this is some existential crisis is overdone, i think, but we didnt win so what do we need differently. I like what were hearing and like the direct line that Governor Jindal took because i think we have we cant be too yeah, we nearly were in the fiscal cliff and could have triggered a big tax increase. I dont want to be stupid but you also need to be principled and consistent in your values and i think we are. And, you know, well see what happens in the next year or two. And marco rubio does seem to be rising to the top of the heap. Yeah, look, hes everything we need and more, hes modern. He knows who tupac is. He is on social media. Hes part of the sort of he has all the blessings of the old political establishment. Hes close to the younger bushes. He and jeb bush and george p. Bush create what i call that axis of enlightenment when it comes to immigration. I mean, hes got the policy. Hes in touch with i think the lives of ordinary people and hes a very accessible guy. He talks about being a working dad and juggling his own priorities. Youre shaking your head on tupac. You know, i think all of this stuff is just surface stuff. Its like lipstick on a pig. The bottom line is the republicans have a core values problem, not who knows who tupac shakur is. Let me just say, i dont want to gloss over his credentials and i think when it comes to Immigration Reform, president obama has stolen from rubio. Rubio has a piecemeal approach to the immigration stuff. I mean president obama took pieces of that piecemeal approach. Well, bottom line is, i think where the country is, we want more aggressive, more direct reform on Immigration Reform than m