Stymied by a GOP House, Obama looks ahead to 2014 to cement his legacy

President Obama, now facing the consequences of automatic spending cuts and the complications they raise for his broader domestic agenda, is taking the most specific steps of his administration in an attempt to ensure the election of a Democratic-controlled Congress in two years. “What I can’t do is force Congress to do the right thing,” Obama told reporters at the White House on Friday...

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Senate postpones deliberation of gun bills

Senators working on legislation to curb gun violence postponed consideration of the measures for at least a week Thursday, a move that gives a bipartisan group working on a plan to expand the nation’s gun background check system more time to reach an agreement. The Senate Judiciary Committee agreed to reconvene March 7 to begin considering bills sponsored by Democrats to revamp the background...

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Sequester spin gets ahead of reality

The descriptions of the post-sequester landscape coming from the Obama administration have been alarming, specific — and, in at least some cases, hyped. Take the claim by Education Secretary Arne Duncan that there are “literally teachers now who are getting pink slips.” When he was pressed in a White House briefing Wednesday to name an example, Duncan came up with one school district,...

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Titles for Hillary’s book

The Oscars — all 31/2 hours — are over. So now it’s time to announce far more important contest winners — the five best entries in the In the Loop “Title Hillary’s Memoir” contest. In January, with her tenure as secretary of state ending, Hillary Rodham Clinton said she would pen a memoir, and we had asked Loop Fans to help her with a title.A large percentage of the hundreds of entries...

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Legislative branch prepares for spending cuts

Lawmakers will return to work Monday after a week-long break, with $85 billion in automatic spending cuts set to take effect in four days. Congressional offices and agencies have remained largely quiet on the issue compared with the executive branch, where top officials — from President Obama to Cabinet members such as Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and Defense Secretary Leon...

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Senators near a deal on background checks for most private gun sales

A bipartisan group of senators is on the verge of a deal that would expand background checks to all private firearms sales with limited exemptions, but significant disagreements remain on the issue of keeping records of private gun sales, according to aides familiar with the talks. An agreement would be a bold first step toward consideration of legislation to limit gun violence in the...

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Group releases list of 90 medical ‘don’ts’

Don’t use feeding tubes in patients with advanced dementia. Don’t use drugs to aggressively treat diabetes in those older than 65. Don’t automati­cally use imaging technology for minor head injuries in children and headaches in adults. And don’t give antacids to babies with reflux. Those are among the 90 medical “don’ts” on a list being released Thursday by a coalition of doctor and consumer...

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Mixing it up in the Cabinet

With President Obama expected to soon name Gina McCarthy as his pick to head the Environmental Protection Agency, he’s adding women to his Cabinet at a pretty decent clip. But he’s running out of chances to ensure racial diversity in his circle of top advisers. Last month, funnyman Jon Stewart zinged the White House for its “Zero Dark Appointees” in a “Daily Show” segment about...

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Obama reaches out to Republican senators on immigration overhaul

Facing criticism for failing to reach out to Republicans negotiating an immigration overhaul, President Obama placed phone calls Tuesday afternoon to three GOP senators involved in an eight-member bipartisan group working on the issue. Obama spoke separately to Republican Sens. Marco Rubio (Fla.), Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.) and John McCain (Ariz.) about their efforts to negotiate a bill,...

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Other countries court skilled immigrants frustrated by U.S. visa laws

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — The contraption sits in a basement lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a mish-mash of hoses, wires, whirring pumps and a 12-foot high plastic tower filled with dripping water, all set on plastic milk crates. It looks like a high school science project, but it was developed by two post-doctoral mechanical engineers at MIT. And it just might be a break-through...

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Will young adults face ‘rate shock’ because of the health-care law?

Many young, healthy Americans could soon see a jump in their health-insurance costs, and insurance companies are saying: It’s not our fault. The nation’s insurers are engaged in an all-out, last-ditch effort to shield themselves from blame for what they predict will be rate increases on new policies they must unveil this spring to comply with President Obama’s health-care law. Insurers...

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Postmaster takes case for five-day mail delivery to skeptical senators

Postmaster General Patrick R. Donahoe took his controversial plan for five-day mail delivery before a congressional hearing Wednesday, where he told senators that the Postal Service “needs your help.” Donahoe’s refrain was familiar. ●The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) is losing $25 million a day.●Last year, the Postal Service lost $15.9 billion.●It defaulted on $11.1 billion...

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Obama urges a move away from narrow focus on politics of austerity

Just about every argument in Washington since the 2010 midterm elections, which returned control of the House to Republicans, has centered on reducing the federal deficit. On Tuesday night, President Obama leaned into his second term by declaring that a single-minded focus on deficit reduction would jeopardize the nation’s future. And he sounded an urgent call to rebuild. Reelected by...

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A taste for diplomacy

Critical Loop Information Bulletin for heads of state, foreign ministers and their chefs: An excellent meal of fine food and wine has often been the key to successful diplomatic negotiations. So if you’re hosting Secretary of State John Kerry, here are some pointers. In arranging a dinner with the former senator last year, one host asked whether Kerry had meal preferences.One aide...

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Marco Rubio emerges as GOP’s star. But is he the answer for Republicans?

Lately, it seems just about everyone is fascinated by the junior senator from Florida. Time’s current cover proclaims Marco Rubio “The Republican Savior.” The Web site BuzzFeed last week solicited his views on immigration, climate change, gay rights — and the relative artistic merits of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G. That test of his hip-hop fluency came after Rubio released a Spotify...

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Panetta fighting to the end against proposed defense spending cuts

As he prepares to retire to his California walnut farm this month, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta is still fighting the battle that has consumed his entire tenure at the Pentagon: an increasingly desperate campaign to persuade Congress not to whack defense spending. In recent days, Panetta, 74, has uttered near-apocalyptic warnings about what will happen if Congress does not do something...

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Lawmakers propose giving federal judges role in drone strikes, but hurdles await

A proposal to give federal judges a direct role in the nation’s drone campaign gained new momentum this week with a signal from senior lawmakers that they intend to consider creating a special court to oversee the selection of targets for lethal strikes. But the idea, cited by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), among others, as a way to impose new accountability on the drone program, faces...

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Immigration advocates push Republicans to support path to citizenship

Immigration advocates, backed by the White House, have begun a nationwide lobbying campaign, including rallies in more than a dozen cities and a planned demonstration on the Mall. The loosely coordinated effort is aimed in part at influencing an ongoing debate in the Republican Party over whether to provide a path to citizenship for more than 11 million illegal immigrants, organizers...

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Lobbying down, but advocacy up

Is the lobbying business shrinking or just changing? It’s hard to say. Disclosure reports filed with Congress show that the amount of money spent on lobbying fell for the second year in a row in 2012, according to a tally from the Center for Responsive Politics. Companies and lobbying firms spent $3.3 billion on the influence game last year, down about 1 percent from 2011 — which was itself...

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Strengthening security at the nation’s airports

Most people think of airport security as their walk through the metal detector and the eyeballing by transportation security officers (TSOs). Dan Liddell, whose job it is to protect the flying public at seven airports in central New York, instead sees 17 zones of worker responsibility and hundreds of different tasks. In pursuit of safeguarding the public, Liddell, a federal security director...

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