John Boehner's proposal “could put us on a path to go over the cliff,” senior administration officials told business representatives. Among the attendees: Tim Pawlenty.

Image by Win McNamee / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — Top White House officials met Wednesday afternoon with leaders of business associations to update them on the fiscal cliff negotiations and to pour cold water on Speaker of the House John Boehner's back-up plan to keep tax rates from rising on nearly all Americans.

Senior administration officials told the business leaders that Boehner's "plan B" "could put us on a path to go over the cliff," according to a source familiar with the meeting.

White House Communications Director Dan Pfieffer said Wednesday that Obama would veto the House Republican plan, which would cut taxes for all income below $1 million, because it doesn't also deal with other components of the fiscal cliff. Boehner is preparing to bring his back-up plan up for a vote tomorrow, citing Obama's previous calls for removing the uncertainty of possible tax hikes for most Americans.

The attendees, held up briefly at the White House gate by Secret Service, included former Republican presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty and Tom Donahue of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

White House Chief of Staff Jack Lew, Senior Adviser Valerie Jarrett, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, National Economic Council director Gene Sperling, and OMB director Jeff Zients participated in the meeting.

The full list of business community attendees:

Tom Donohue, U.S. Chamber
Gov Engler, BRT
Gov Pawlenty, Financial Svcs Roundtable
Rob Nichols, Financial Services Forum
Marion Blakey, AIA
Bob Stevens, LMCO
Jay Timmons, NAM
Dan Danner, NFIB

Otherwise known as Washington, D.C.

Image by Senate TV / AP

WASHINGTON — Senators Joe Lieberman, Dick Durbin, Patty Murray, and Barbara Boxer introduced legislation Wednesday to grant Washington, D.C. statehood, creating the nation's 51st state — "New Columbia."

The state would not include all of the current district according to a press release, leaving federal buildings and the National Mall under Congress' control.

If the law passes Congress, D.C. residents would hold a vote for statehood, and if successful would be the first state admitted to the Union since Hawaii in August 21, 1959.

Lieberman, who is retiring from the Senate next month, called the effort to grant Washington, D.C. statehood "unfinished business" of his career. As Chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Lieberman has had oversight of legislation dealing with the capital city.

“It is long past time to give those American citizens who have chosen the District of Columbia as their home the voice they deserve in our democracy,” Lieberman said in a statement. “The United States is the only democracy in the world that denies voting representation to the people who live in its capital city. As I retire from the Senate after having had the great privilege of serving here for 24 years, securing full voting rights for the 600,000 disenfranchised people who live in the District is unfinished business, not just for me, but for the United States of America.”

SENATORS MOVE FORWARD WITH D.C. STATEHOOD BILL
INTRODUCE THE NEW COLUMBIA ADMISSIONS ACT

WASHINGTON— Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chairman Joe Lieberman, ID-Conn., and Senators Dick Durbin, R-Ill., Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., introduced legislation Wednesday granting Washington D.C. full statehood, including full voter representation in Congress for its residents.

The New Columbia Admissions Act, S. 3696, is the first D.C. statehood bill to be introduced in the Senate since 1993. It would create a 51st state called New Columbia. In January 2011, Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D-DC, introduced companion legislation in the House, H.R. 265.

“It is long past time to give those American citizens who have chosen the District of Columbia as their home the voice they deserve in our democracy,” said Lieberman. “The United States is the only democracy in the world that denies voting representation to the people who live in its capital city. As I retire from the Senate after having had the great privilege of serving here for 24 years, securing full voting rights for the 600,000 disenfranchised people who live in the District is unfinished business, not just for me, but for the United States of America.”

“It might surprise some students of American history to know that it wasn’t until the 1964 election that residents of the District of Columbia were finally able to cast a ballot for President and Vice President of the United States,” said Durbin. “Unfortunately, the disenfranchisement of these citizens is not yet a relic of history. More than a half century later, Washingtonians are still denied full voting representation in Congress. I first voted in favor of this legislation nearly two decades ago, and I will continue to stand with the people of the District until they are granted the voting rights that they deserve.”

“I am proud to join with Senators Lieberman, Durbin, and Boxer in co-sponsoring this long-overdue legislation,” said Murray. “Residents of the District of Columbia have been denied their right to fully participate in our democracy for far too long, and this legislation would finally give residents a voice.”

If passed by Congress, the act would allow D.C. residents to endorse statehood by a district-wide vote. New Columbia would include residential neighborhoods and business districts where the majority of D.C. residents live and work. It would not incorporate sections of D.C. where most government buildings and the Mall are located. That area would remain under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Congress as a federal district.

Political theater meets the real thing. “This is more people than I've ever seen at a press conference.”

Image by Kris Connor / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — During a week of real-life political drama, Capitol Hill made way for three Hollywood celebrities Wednesday.

Ben Affleck testified before the House Armed Services Committee on how the U.S. might curb violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. And as a treat to senators, leaders Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell scheduled a private screening of "Lincoln" and a question-and-answer session afterward with director Steven Spielberg and the film's stars, including Daniel Day-Lewis.

It is often said in Washington, usually with good-humored self-awareness and a little insecurity, that the nation's capital is "Hollywood on the Potomac": An industry town in the spotlight and in a bubble, albeit with less glamorous inhabitants. But Wednesday's stars left the Capitol star-struck.

For an hour before Reid trotted out the "Lincoln" celebrities for a photo-op, journalists and staffers crowded the Ohio Clock Corridor, waiting.

“This is so exciting!” said one reporter as he waited to catch a brief glimpse of Spielberg and Day-Lewis.

"This is more people than I've ever seen at a press conference," another marveled.

Indeed, the event swamped any that had been held to discuss the fiscal cliff negotiations.

Earlier, in an unrelated star turn, Affleck caused a minor stir of his own.

After the Armed Services Committee had discussed for roughly two hours the myriad grave issues facing the Congo, including its shockingly high rate of rape, among the highest in the world, the first witnesses filed out so that a new cast, Affleck among them, could take its place.

A gaggle of photographers rushed to grab a shot.

"I don't know why the media seems to be quite interested in this hearing," Rep. Buck McKeon, the chair of the Armed Services Committee, joked.

Affleck took his role more seriously.

"My name is Ben Affleck," he said redundantly. "I am the founder of the Eastern Congo Initiative."

Affleck has traveled to the Congo many times in that capacity, and came armed with a lengthy set of prepared remarks. He sped through those, trying to squeeze his broad thoughts into the committee's five-minute limit for opening statements.

"I'm rushing to get through the five minutes, which I think I passed 15 minutes ago," Affleck apologized, taking a breath.

McKeon, clearly unconcerned, grinned back, holding the gavel to his chin in repose.

Over the course of three hours, the committee's discussion centered on whether the U.S., which currently sends more than $400 million to the Congo annually, should help train the country's troops to defend against rebel-driven violence.

"I don't think the U.S. can continue being the world's police cop," Republican Rep. Austin Scott said during the committee's sober pre-Affleck session.

Later, under a celebrity's high-wattage gaze, the tone changed.

"Mr. Affleck, if you could put a positive thing on this," said Rep. Adam Smith, the ranking Democrat on the committee. "Talk to me about some of the positive stuff that is going on right now in the DRC."

“Chuck Hagel is being misrepresented as anti-Israel and 'soft' on Iran, Hamas, and Hezbollah.”

The attacks on potential Secretary of Defense nominee Chuck Hagel from the right are leading his allies to launch a nascent campaign in his defense.

Foreign Policy's The Cable blog reports that Hagel's friends, shocked at what they view as unfair attacks from commentators who have accused Hagel of borderline anti-Semitic views about Israel, are sending around a memo called "Facts About Chuck Hagel" as part of what they say will be a loosely organized campaign in support of him.

The fact sheet looks to be a two-page Word document detailing Hagel's record on Israel, Iran, and a number of other topics in foreign policy. It quotes Hagel's book and a few other supporters, like former diplomat Aaron David Miller.

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And why hawks don't like him. He favors an opening to the Islamic Republic, and has opposed sanctions.

Now we’ve got a choice here, we can continue to push Iran out and back, and say to Iran, We will give you the privilege of sitting down and talking with us based on our preconditions. And as that goes on, Iran continues most likely to develop nuclear capabilities, it continues to enhance its position with a significant population in the Middle East, which is a direct threat against Israel, a direct threat against the interests of the United States, a threat against Iraq...

If we continue to push countries back away and out, and we don’t engage, then it is very predictable what the outcome is going to be...

You cannot take any of these challenges and deal with them in capsules, and in compartments. Iran has everything to do with the outcome in Iraq, the outcome of the Israeli Palestinian issue, of the Middle East itself, the stability of those Persian gulf countries, of oil...

[W]hen we’re talking about Iran, I believe that is going to require some kind of security gift. I believe it's going to require some easy-to-do breakthroughs like an interest section, commercial exchange of flights. We can do those kinds of things.

In a Washington Post op-ed from earlier this year, Hagel and three co-authors warned against military action in Iran in the near future.

If the United States attacks, it could set back for several years Iran’s ability to build a nuclear weapon. If the objective were large-scale damage to Iran’s military and weapons capability, the United States could achieve substantial success. But without large numbers of troops on the ground, we doubt that U.S. military attacks from the air — even if supplemented by other means such as drones, covert operations and cyberattacks — could eliminate Iran’s capability to build a nuclear weapon, unseat the regime or force it to capitulate to U.S. demands.

In an interview with al-Monitor, Hagel praised Obama's foreign policy positions in Iran and the rest of the Middle East:

There are a lot of things I don’t agree with him on; he knows it. I have the honor and privilege of seeing those guys a lot. [Vice President] Joe [Biden] is a good friend. Obama and I got to know each other pretty well in the Senate even though he wasn’t there very long. As you know, he asked Jack Reed (D-Rhode Island) and me to go to the Middle East with him so we spent a lot time [together]… I have the highest regard for him in every way. I think he’s one of the finest, most decent individuals I’ve ever known and one of the smartest… I try to remind my Republican friends when they hammer him that this is a guy who inherited the biggest agenda of problems in this country ever inherited by a president since Franklin Roosevelt and maybe worse. Roosevelt didn’t inherit two wars that were messes with a global financial crisis. Everywhere you look, this guy had problems to try to dig his way out of it. And I think he deserves some credit.

In an interview with Foreign Policy in May, he made a similar point, saying "I think Obama is handling this exactly the right way."

Hagel's words of praise for Obama's positions toward Iran are held up by his defenders as an indication that he is not to Obama's left on foreign policy, as the Washington Post editorial board has alleged.

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Jimmy Carter's grandson turns his big scoop into a career. He's already taken down another Republican with a hidden-camera video.

Researcher James Carter unearthed and helped take public the now-famous "47 percent" video of Mitt Romney at a private fundraiser in Florida.

Source: s3.amazonaws.com

The freelance researcher who became a minor campaign celebrity after unearthing the now-infamous video of Mitt Romney railing against 47 percent of Americans at a private fundraiser has used his political fame to start his own opposition research firm.

When the researcher, James Carter IV, first saw the secretly recorded footage of Romney in August, he immediately identified it as a bombshell, and sent it to David Corn, a Mother Jones reporter with whom he had worked in the past. When the magazine published the scoop — headline: SECRET VIDEO: Romney Tells Millionaire Donors What He REALLY Thinks of Obama Voters” — Corn received a solo byline, with Carter getting a modest mention at the foot of the post: “Research assistance: James Carter.”

Corn would later turn what his magazine called "the scoop of the decade" into a HarperCollins e-book, which he titled, 47 Percent: Uncovering the Romney Video That Rocked the 2012 Election. Carter is thanked in the acknowledgements for "his diligent pursuit of the source for the Romney fundraising video and for introducing the two of us," writes Corn. "It was a consequential hook-up."

It was, in fact, Carter who found the video, researched Romney fundraisers, identified the likely location and date of the one featured in the video, and convinced the source of the footage through a series of Twitter direct messages to hand it over to Corn.

"[Corn] got a lot of the credit for it, and that's fine — that's the way it had always worked," Carter told BuzzFeed, adding, "I was perfectly fine with it. I'm the research guy, and he was the reporter and publicist."

After the 47 percent video broke, Carter got a slew of job offers from news organizations such as the Huffington Post, Reuters, and the Daily Beast.

But he knew early on that a job in media wasn't for him. “I’m very partisan,” he said. “The way I look at it, having to even acknowledge that there’s another side of the argument is doing the other side’s work for them.”

So he decided to start his own opposition research firm instead. He didn’t know how to start a business, but his cousin lawyer helped him file the papers, and on Oct. 15, he officially opened Carter Research, LLC for business.

The firm operates from Carter’s home in Atlanta, where he and his wife work together side-by-side. “She’s the writer, and does some researcher too, but she mainly puts it in a form that’s presentable to the client,” he said.

Carter’s first big victory was a campaign he did for Better Georgia, a progressive advocacy organization that wanted to dislodge Chip Rogers, Republican majority leader of the state Senate, before leadership elections in November.

In late September, Rogers sent out an invitation on his majority leader stationary to 35 Republican members of the Senate inviting them to an Oct. 11 closed-door “Agenda 21 Information Session.” The four-hour event would feature a lunch, movie, and PowerPoint presentation.

According to the invitation, the discussion would focus on the ways in which Agenda 21 — a United Nations resolution that has become the target of conservative derision — was “fostering a Socialist plan to change the way we live, eat, learn, and communicate,” read the invitation.

Carter sneaked a videographer into the meeting — 47-percent style — and got it all on tape. Carter said the meeting, led by Rogers, was even more damaging than he'd hoped. One of the slides in the PowerPoint showed the number of deaths by famine under Stalin and Mao. Listed beneath the two dictators was Obama — famine death count: “TBD.” Rogers also warned that Obama was using a mind-control techniques.

“We were hoping to just get anything that we could add to our Chip Rogers file,” said Carter. “But it was better than we were expecting. It went national.”

The Rogers video was featured first on Nov. 11 in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Three days later, it got picked up by Mother Jones. And finally, on Nov. 17, Rachel Maddow gave Carter’s video its own segment. Maddow called it "lunacy."

While the Senate was holding its leadership votes that week, Rogers withdrew his name before resigning altogether two weeks later on Dec. 4 to take a job in public television. “The governor got him his own television show just to get him out of there,” said Carter.

His success is perhaps one reason, as Carter said, “clients generally just come to me.” And just two months ago he kept a plea for employment — “currently looking for work” — prominently displayed in his bio line on Twitter. Then, said Carter, opposition research was “just what I would do in my spare time,” he said. “Being paid for my hobby was a pipe dream, because I was doing it for free anyway.”

Carter graduated high school in 1995, and he's reticent about how he spent the years between then and now, claiming he doesn't even keep track of his age.

“I can never remember. I actually stopped counting, because a lot of those years run together. I was worthless for a while,” he said, recounting intermittent drug issues he has since resolved.

Carter is close with his grandfather, although he is careful not to be the first to bring up the former president in conversations. As Corn noted in 47 Percent, “I wouldn’t learn of his relationship to the former president until early September," when the two met at the Democratic National Convention nearly two months after they began emailing.

But “whenever big stories come out that I contributed to,” said Carter, “I would send them out to my family.” And when he sent out the 47 percent video, the former president sent James an e-mail. It was the first time his grandfather had ever responded to one of his e-mails.

“James: This is extraordinary,” wrote the former president. “Congratulations! Papa.”

Normal operating procedure, Boehner's and Cantor's offices say. But conservative groups aren't happy.

Image by Yuri Gripas / Reuters

WASHINGTON — At the weekly off-the-record meeting of Grover Norquist's group Americans for Tax Reform on Wednesday, surrogates for House Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor pitched the fiscal cliff "plan B" that has left moderate and conservative Republicans divided.

"The reaction I heard was that these guys could sell ice to an Eskimo," said one prominent conservative, who spoke with multiple people who attended the meeting.

The pitch seems to have worked: At noon, shortly after its 10:30 a.m. meeting, ATR issued a press release supporting "plan B," which would raise taxes on income exceeding $1 million.

"Having finally seen actual legislation in writing, ATR is now able to make its determination about a legislative proposal related to the fiscal cliff," Norquist said. "ATR will not consider a vote for this measure a violation of the Taxpayer Protection Pledge."

That declaration — and even House officials' appearance at the core conservative event — left conservative groups, which have staunchly opposed any tax increase as part of a compromise package to avert the fiscal cliff, stunned.

“Americans for Tax Reform’s support of Speaker Boehner's Plan B finally reveals what many of us have known for some time – Grover Norquist and his organization are nothing but a front group for the Republican Party, and their agenda to protect the wealthy from paying their fair share of taxes,” Frank Clemente, the campaign manager of Americans for Tax Fairness, said in a statement Thursday.

But the offices for Boehner and Cantor said that they attend Norquist's meetings regularly, and that speaking about "plan B" on Wednesday was not out of the ordinary.

"Not news," a spokesperson for Boehner wrote in an email, adding that Boehner's office has a presence at the meeting every week.

Meanwhile, Cantor's deputy chief of staff Neil Bradley has attended roughly three of the past six meetings.

"He goes to that meeting often," one Cantor aide said. "It wasn't to lobby, but to merely explain, as he does often, what's going on."

"Given Plan B is our focus this week, he addressed that," the aide added. "It's as simple as that."

Norquist and his spokesperson did not respond to requests for comment.

The New York Senator writes that he realized a total gun ban was a mistake when he went hunting in Nebraska with Senator Ben Nelson in 2009. Here's a picture of that historic moment.

Source: politico.com

A look back at the most GIF'd year in the history of the electoral process.

Source: intrepidgirlblogger

Source: http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_md8a3coDVZ1rtxen9o1_500.gif

Source: topherchris.com

Source: http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mch0q4DWDo1rtxen9o1_400.gif

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The Newark mayor says he will “finish the work we started” in his second term and “explore the possibility of running for United States Senate in 2014.” A source says he's decided to run for Senate.

In a video uploaded to his YouTube page Thursday morning, Newark Mayor Cory Booker — thought to be the Democratic challenger to Gov. Chris Christie in the 2013 New Jersey gubernatorial race — announced that he will complete his second term as mayor and "explore the possibility of running for United States Senate in 2014."

"As I explore a run for the United States Senate," says Booker, "I look forward to consulting with Senator Frank Lautenberg."

But a source close to Booker told BuzzFeed that the mayor's plans are a bit further along than that, and that Booker has in fact decided to run for Senate in 2014.

If Lautenberg goes not give up his seat, Booker would have to challenge the senior Senator in a Democratic primary. Lautenberg would be 90 years old running for a six-year term in 2014, were he to run for reelection.

Santa recounted a devastating experience “a fews back” where he went to a Christmas party called a “holiday party.” He is still recovering.

h/t Think Progress

The Obama administration “convinced him to run for Senate” instead of governor, a source tells BuzzFeed. But a primary against Lautenberg would be “an unpleasant episode.”

Image by Julio Cortez / AP

New Jersey state Democrats were disappointed Thursday morning to learn that Newark Mayor Cory Booker had made an official decision to opt out of the 2013 gubernatorial race.

A senior New Jersey official told BuzzFeed that Booker's choice to run for Senate in 2014 instead — issuing a potential primary challenge to current senior Senator Frank Lautenberg — was influenced in large part by the White House.

A second source — a national Democratic official — confirmed that Booker received outside counsel from the White House.

"The White House weighed in and convinced him to run for Senate," said the New Jersey Democrat. "They viewed him as an asset that they didn't want to tarnish, and they wanted him in the Senate."

The Obama administration appears to have started reaching out to Booker at the beginning of December, the source said.

"Cory's hard to read, but when you have the White House and a collection of other people all saying the same thing to you, it becomes very hard to ignore. The establishment of the party was saying, 'Cory, don't run, you're gonna lose,'" the New Jersey Democrat told BuzzFeed.

The incumbent Republican Gov. Chris Christie gave President Barack Obama — who is also a longtime Booker ally — a key boost in the last days of the 2012 campaign.

The decision was a "disappointment" to state Democrats who felt Booker would have given Gov. Christie a more vigorous challenge than any other potential gubernatorial candidate. The New Jersey Democratic partner will now have to work with a host of bench players — such as progressive state Sen. Barbara Buono, who announced her candidacy earlier this month — as well as now-likely candidates Rep. Bill Pascrell and former New Jersey Gov. Dick Codey.

It became clear that Booker would not run, said the source, when "he went into the Bunker last week and you just couldn't get to him."

"The White House essentially conceded the New Jersey governor's race in December of 2012," said the Democrat.

If Sen. Lautenberg goes not give up his seat, Booker would have to challenge the senior senator in a Democratic primary. Lautenberg would be 90 years old running for a six-year term in 2014, were he to run for reelection, but is still not expected to step down, say state officials.

"Frank has not spoken at all about his intention to retire, and the Senate race is more than 13 months away, which in New Jersey politics is 13 lifetimes," said the New Jersey Democrat.

A Democratic primary, said the source, "would be an unpleasant episode for New Jersey."

In a statement, a spokesman for Lautenberg said the senator "is focused on passing a critical disaster relief bill for New Jersey and addressing America's broken gun laws. This is not the time for political distractions and the Senator will address politics next year."

White House and Democratic National Committee officials didn't immediately respond to an inquiry about Booker's decision.

Update: This post has been updated to reflect a second source confirming that the White House had a hand in the Newark mayor's decision, as well as a statement from a spokesman for Sen. Lautenberg.

A major shift for a key conservative. Gingrich oversaw passage of the Defense of Marriage Act as speaker of the House of Representatives in the 1990s.

Image by Jemal Countess / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said he can accept the "reality" of marriage between same-sex couples as a "legal document issued by the state" — as strong a sign as any that the landscape for marriage equality has changed dramatically in the past year.

"The momentum is clearly now in the direction in finding some way to ... accommodate and deal with reality. And the reality is going to be that in a number of American states -- and it will be more after 2014 -- gay relationships will be legal, period," Gingrich told The Huffington Post in a story published on Thursday.

Gingrich "continued to profess a belief that marriage is defined as being between a man and a woman," Sam Stein and Jon Ward report, but "suggested that the party (and he himself) could accept a distinction between a 'marriage in a church from a legal document issued by the state' -- the latter being acceptable."

Of the change, though, Gingrich said, "I think that this will be much more difficult than immigration for conservatism to come to grips with."

The move from the former House speaker comes a month after voters in Washington, Maryland and Maine voted in favor of marriage equality ballot measures and after voters elected a record number of out LGBT politicians to Congress, including the first out LGBT senator in Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin.

Regarding the time when Gingrich served as House speaker and the Defense of Marriage Act, now before the Supreme Court, was put up for debate, he said, "I didn't think that was inevitable 10 or 15 years ago, when we passed the Defense of Marriage Act. It didn't seem at the time to be anything like as big a wave of change as we are now seeing."

Several others involved in the 1996 law's passage — including Rep. Bob Barr, who sponsored the legislation, and President Clinton, who signed it into law — have since said that they now oppose DOMA and support marriage equality.

In the interview, Gingrich acknowledged his half-sister, Candace Gingrich-Jones, who works at the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest LGBT political group. Stein and Ward report that Gingrich said he has gay friends who've gotten married in Iowa.

HRC's president, Chad Griffin called the move remarkable.

"Newt Gingrich has proven that leaders in the Republican party understand where the country is moving on marriage but he is also brave enough to say it out loud," Griffin told BuzzFeed. "It’s remarkable that Gingrich admits he didn’t see the coming power of the LGBT community and our allies back in 1996 but now understands the wave of change that’s sweeping over the nation."

As the Supreme Court considers whether DOMA's federal definition limiting "marriage" to one man and one woman is constitutional, Griffin noted of Gingrich's changed view, "His comments give room for other Republican leaders to reflect on the direction in which the country is heading and get on the right side of history."

Robert Raben, a lobbyist who was Democratic counsel for the House subcommittee that considered DOMA in 1996, had only one word in response to Gingrich's comments: "Wow."

For Candace Gringrich-Jones, the move has been a long time coming. She has worked with HRC on its National Coming Out Day activities and more since 1995 and told BuzzFeed, "On a personal level, reading the interview made me proud of my brother."

Adding of her relationship, she noted, "The time my wife Rebecca and I have spent with Newt has had an effect and he has evolved on marriage. I know this was just one interview and I don’t imagine he’ll be Googling PFLAG anytime soon (www.pflag.org in case you do, Newt), but it is most definitely progress."

She also suggested that her family isn't alone, noting, "And while the rest of America may not get the spotlight my family does, this same progress is happening everywhere. It is inspiring to know that the conversations we as LGBT people have with our families and loved ones, neighbors, co-workers and classmates, can lead to real change in hearts and minds. It’s not an easy journey, and it sure ain’t over, but I hope our family’s experience can give a little hope to those who are on the same path."

A spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, who is leading the defense of DOMA before the Supreme Court, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A bitter moment in the fiscal cliff talks.

Image by Gary Cameron / Reuters

WASHINGTON — Administration officials believe that John Boehner is proposing an alternative fiscal plan because he can't bring his own House Republican caucus to the table for a deal Boehner himself proposed to the President Obama this weekend, a senior administration official told BuzzFeed Thursday.

"Senior administration officials have been told by Republicans that the reason the Speaker turned to Plan B is that he concluded that he couldn't get sufficient Republican support for the offer that he presented to the President over the weekend," the official told BuzzFeed.

The overt shot at Boehner's control of his members comes at a bitter point in the negotiations between the White House and the speaker over a plan to avert a set of mandated spending cuts, especially to defense spending, and automatic tax increases. Boehner, who maintains an at-times-fragile grip on his very conservative caucus, is facing intense pressure from his right to back off his consent to tax rate increases on millionaires — a component of both his "plan b" and various drafts of a comprehensive agreement with the president.

Obama didn't accept Boehner's offer, instead proposing a counter-offer of his own. Boehner's office responded to the administration charge calling it "stupid and untrue."

"This is stupid and untrue," said spokesman Michael Steel. "Once the White House leaked their latest offer, the Speaker’s office immediately briefed reporters to explain how absurdly unbalanced it was. The Speaker was clear that he could not support the President’s plan, let alone recommend it to Members of the House.”

Boehner faced a backlash from within his caucus on the back-up plan, which would only deal with the middle class tax cuts. Realizing the plan didn't have the votes, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor quickly introduced a spending cut bill Wednesday that would replace the mandatory "sequester" cuts. Cantor said Thursday morning that House Republicans have the votes to pass both measures today.

The White House has already threatened to veto the "Plan B" and has accused Boehner of wasting time instead of negotiating a solution to the fiscal cliff. Boehner has called on Obama to "get serious" and present him with an offer with 1:1 spending cuts and revenue increases. (The White House maintains they've met that criteria, but the two sides disagree whether interest savings should be counted as spending cuts.)

Both sides maintain that staff talks between the two sides continue, but the two principals haven't spoken since Monday night.

With actual little movement toward a resolution, the war of words is heating up.

Image by Joshua Roberts / Reuters

WASHINGTON — With negotiations over the fiscal cliff seemingly stalled, the rhetorical war between Democrats and Republicans on Thursday quickly devolved into name-calling and finger-pointing as both sides sought to avoid blame for the looming collapse.

“We’re not taking up any of the things they’re working on over there,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said of Speaker John Boehner’s evolving “Plan B,” calling them little more than “pointless political stunts” designed to appease Boehner's right wing.

Reid also took a personal shot at Boehner, charging that “he’s been wandering around over there in some kind of befuddlement,” and accused him of trying to protect himself from the wrath of Tea Party conservatives.

“We are not going to do anything to protect the Tea Party leadership in the House,” Reid vowed.

Meanwhile, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor Thursday presented a proposal to replace the sequester — a last-minute addendum to Boehner's "Plan B" — calling spending the "underlying problem" presented by the looming fiscal cliff.

"The president's inability to come to a balanced agreement with our speaker leaves us with no other option," Cantor said.

"This is the best option, and the Senate should support it," Cantor added.

The measure would replace the sequester, which is set to cut roughly $110 billion over the next 10 years, with other spending cuts from welfare and health care programs, and by placing the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau under the purview of Congress, among other items.

House Republicans will vote on Cantor's proposal in addition to Boehner's "Plan B" as a concession to some lawmakers within the conference who said they could not vote for the tax hikes alone.

Despite the sudden movement on Capitol Hill, it remains unclear when a final deal will actually be reached. Reid announced that Thursday is essentially the last full day for the upper chamber until after Christmas, pointing to Friday’s memorial and Sunday funeral in Hawaii for Sen. Daniel Inouye. The Senate will return a week from today to resume work on Hurricane Sandy relief.

Cantor, on the other hand, said the House was not going out of session following tonight’s vote on the "Plan B" proposal, although they could hit the exits sometime Friday morning.

The House speaker rejects that his back-up plan is merely a negotiating tactic.

Image by Jacquelyn Martin / AP

WASHINGTON — House Speaker John Boehner hit back Thursday at suggestions that his "plan B" to avert the fiscal cliff is merely a negotiating tactic, saying he is "not convinced" it would not pass in the Senate.

"I am not convinced at all that the bill when it passes the House today will die in the Senate," Boehner said. "They can pass it, they can amend it. But today, they've done nothing."

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has said repeatedly that the bill would be "dead on arrival" in that chamber. And Reid also insisted Thursday that the Senate's plan to raise taxes on those making $250,000 and above would get "270, 80 votes, and that being conservative" in the House if Boehner brought it to the floor.

"We have conveyed to Speaker Boehner's office in no uncertain terms that the Senate will not act on House Republicans' 'plan B,'" Adam Jentleson, a spokesperson for Reid, added in an email. "Speaker Boehner is fully aware of our position."

"As Sen. Reid has said, Speaker Boehner's plan B is an abject waste of time and there is nothing to discuss until the House acts on the Senate's middle class tax cut."

Nevertheless, House leaders plan to vote Thursday evening on one bill to maintain tax cuts on income less than $1 million, and another to replace the sequester.

The latter measure was introduced as a concession to some House Republicans who felt uncomfortable voting for the tax measure on its own.

Thursday, Boehner would not answer a question about whether he had initially pursued a back-up plan because his latest pitch to the White House didn't have enough GOP support.

The man who would be secretary of defense also supported the ban on open military service for gays and lesbians.

Image by Ali Jarekji / Reuters

WASHINGTON — Former Sen. Chuck Hagel — a finalist for the post of secretary of defense in Obama's second term — once opposed a nominee to be U.S. ambassador to Luxembourg because he was "openly aggressively gay."

“Ambassadorial posts are sensitive," Hagel told to the Omaha World-Herald in 1998, opposing the nomination of philanthropist James Hormel. "They are representing America," he said. "They are representing our lifestyle, our values, our standards. And I think it is an inhibiting factor to be gay — openly aggressively gay like Mr. Hormel — to do an effective job."

Some LGBT rights groups are already criticizing the potential selection of Hagel to replace Leon Panetta.

Hagel was a longtime supporter of "don't ask, don't tell," which banned gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military. In 1999, he told The New York Times, ''The U.S. armed forces aren't some social experiment.''

And between 2001 and 2006, Hagel received a score of zero from the Human Rights Council, with no votes on the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, a job discrimination bill, and the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which eventually was passed into law as part of the National Defense Authorization Act in 2009.

Hagel's record on LGBT issues did show some signs of change, as the country shifted dramatically on the subject. He voted in favor of a procedural vote on the 2004 constitutional amendment aimed at limiting marriage to one man and one woman, but opposed the marriage amendment in 2006.

UPDATE: Hagel didn't vote on the marriage amendment in 2004, though he voted in favor of a procedural motion to bring up the final vote.

McCaskill's evolution on guns continues as she calls “on the NRA to come out of hiding.”

Image by Mark Wilson / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — Sen. Claire McCaskill is urging her supporters to call on the National Rifle Association to back substantive efforts to improve gun laws in the wake of the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary.

"Silence from the NRA will be a clear signal that they don't want meaningful change," McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat, wrote in an email to her supporters.

"That's why I'm asking you to sign my petition, calling on the NRA to come out of hiding, and come to the table."

The push by McCaskill, a moderate Democrat and historically a defender of Second Amendment rights, is the latest in a series of public statements by moderate and conservative Democrats who have suddenly found themselves rushing to the left on gun control.

McCaskill's email also comes one day before the NRA is scheduled to hold a major press conference to announce some unspecified new initiative.

See the full email below:

Dear Friend,

I was stunned and sick to my stomach -- and as a mother, I was horrified -- when I learned about the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

It's appropriate that while we grieve for the students, faculty, and their families, that we've also begun a long-overdue discussion of how to prevent this kind of tragedy. The constitutional right to own guns is not the issue. The issue is commonsense laws that respect that right, but prevent the mass slaughter of innocent Americans.

But as we start work on banning assault weapons and limiting the rounds in magazines -- both commonsense proposals that I strongly support -- too many members of Congress worry about their "score" from the National Rifle Association. The NRA grades senators and representatives based on their votes on gun issues -- and even on issues that have little-to-nothing to do with guns.

Well, I'm a former Jackson County prosecutor who's seen gun violence. And more importantly, I'm a mom, and a grandmother. And I'm delivering a message to the NRA this week: Come to the table to prevent this from happening again. Click here to sign my petition to the NRA if you agree.

Emerging from the tragedy in Newtown, the NRA has an opportunity to lead. An opportunity to come to the table, be a constructive partner, and make their voice a part of the solution to prevent mass murders of innocent children.

But it's their choice. Silence from the NRA will be a clear signal that they don't want meaningful change.

That's why I'm asking you to sign my petition, calling on the NRA to come out of hiding, and come to the table. Click here to sign it now.

Respecting the Second Amendment does not mean abandoning common sense.

The right to own guns in this country must remain, while we also must strengthen our laws to prevent mass shootings. Now, I'm calling on the NRA to use its considerable political influence to help us accomplish those goals.

Click here to sign my petition today.

To solve this problem, we need all parties at the table.

Thank you for your support,

Claire McCaskill

“Those who are still openly, aggressively anti-gay in 2012 probably won't be able to function very well in Washington,” says the Victory Fund's Dison.

Ambassador James Hormel, whom former Senator Chuck Hagel described as "aggressively gay."

The nation's largest LGBT rights group on Thursday called "unacceptable" comments former Sen. Chuck Hagel made in 1998 opposing a Clinton administration nominee because he was "openly aggressively gay."

The 14-year-old comments about Clinton's nominee to be ambassador to Luxembourg, James Hormel, came to light Thursday as Hagel is a front-runner to be nominated by President Obama for defense secretary in his second term.

Human Rights Campaign spokesman Michael Cole-Schwartz also said, however, that "we do not know ... how [Hagel']s views have evolved over time" and that the group "look[s] forward to hearing from Senator Hagel on these issues should he be nominated."

The Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund, which works to support out LGBT presidential appointees, noted that times have changed since Hormel's nomination.

"Today openly LGBT Americans serve throughout the three branches of the federal government, and at very high levels," Victory Fund vice president of communications Denis Dison said. "Those who are still openly, aggressively anti-gay in 2012 probably won't be able to function very well in Washington."

Referring to Hagel's earlier opposition to the repeal of the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy that banned out military service, Cole-Schwartz added: "It is critically important that the new Secretary of Defense is supportive of open service, lesbian and gay military families, and the community as a whole. Whomever is selected to be the next Secretary of Defense needs to understand there are clear expectations for progress at DOD and that the President’s views on key issues should be reflected by the Secretary."

Hagel told to the Omaha World-Herald in 1998, in opposing the nomination of philanthropist Hormel, that ambassadors "are representing America. ... They are representing our lifestyle, our values, our standards. And I think it is an inhibiting factor to be gay — openly aggressively gay like Mr. Hormel — to do an effective job."

An email blast to 75,000 people across the country on the day the Newark Mayor says he's “exploring” a run in 2014. “Cory Booker is running for Senate.”

Image by Olivier Douliery / Abaca Press

Pac Plus, a membership-based organization housed under the 527 group PowerPac, sent an email Thursday in support of Newark Mayor Cory Booker's run for U.S. Senate in 2014. The group, which focuses on electing progressive minority candidates, lists seven reasons Booker's race is one to watch — the last: "There are no African Americans serving in the U.S. Senate." The email was sent to 75,000 people nationwide, according to a PowerPac official.

"Every progressive person in America should support Cory Booker’s campaign for U.S. Senate," writes Steve Phillips, founder and chairman of PowerPac, on the Pac Plus website. "[N]ow we need new vehicles to champion change over the next several years, and Cory Booker’s campaign is one of the best vehicles for that kind of movement that I have seen in many years. Progressives from coast to coast should enthusiastically embrace and back his candidacy."

The Pac Plus email blast: