Friday Funday: Kicking A Bad Habit

Since some of our newest subscribers may not be aware of our usual drill, allow us to quickly explain. Every Friday here at The Daily Felltoon, we usually attempt to veer off a bit from politics and focus on something positive. However, we're also aware we haven't completely closed out the 'fiscal cliff' story, since the deal between President Obama and the Republicans in Congress was reached earlier this week, when we were still on holiday break.

Thus, we'll make our fiscal cliff summary short today, since we've also been giving you such great links to thorough coverage of the fiscal cliff story in our daily e-mail editions and daily archive.

The long and short on the cliff story is simple. The 112th Congress did the only thing they seemed to be good at, kicking the proverbial can down the road. America did go "over the cliff" for a couple of days, raising taxes back to Clinton-era rates, though President Obama's tax cut plan technically brought income tax rates back down for most Americans.

The way the deal was handled most certainly means the grizzly bear of the debt ceiling is waiting in the wings for Congress and the President to deal with over the next two months, spurred on by the extremists in the Republican Party.

Thankfully, the ridiculous drama of the fiscal cliff is over, for now.

On a positive note, the new Congress - the 113th - was sworn in on Thursday, and included some new members we're very happy to see on board, including Senator Elizabeth Warren, Representative Kyrsten Sinema, and an acquaintance of ours, through our South Florida bureau, Rep. Alan Grayson.

There are a great deal of topics that need to be handled at the federal level over the next two years, as President Obama recently stated, everything from ending the war in Afghanistan to comprehensive immigration reform, to gun safety laws, to education, election reform, and climate change.

It's not a small list - but it's also one we see no real reason that can't be accomplished.

Yes, we're aware that the extremist Republicans still control 51 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, and between 15 and 25 seats in the U.S. Senate. There are 435 members of the House and 100 Senators, however - more than enough to override any small group of extremists, from either end of the binary political spectrum, especially if they work together across party lines.

We sincerely hope that this 113th Congress looks at why so much of America is disgusted with them, as New Jersey Governor Chris Christie clearly pointed out this week. On a specific note, Christie rightly took Speaker Boehner and the extremist Republicans to task for wasting nine weeks (and counting) to pass a relief bill for areas affected by Superstorm Sandy.

On a larger note, the reason Americans are angry with our so-called representatives is because the 112th Congress kicked the can down the road - or off the cliff - on almost every topic imaginable, especially the tough ones.

Instead of branding this new Congress with the sins of the last one though, we're trying to kick something ourselves - the habit of holding a grudge against the last assembly.

Today marks the first full day of the 113th Congress. Let's wish them all well, and hope they can do what we've sent them to Washington, DC to do. Namely, solve issues too big for our cities and states, and find compromise solutions that will help make America better.

Hung Up

By the time you read this, we can assure you that many of our media colleagues will have already chewed through the 'fiscal cliff' deal story, thrown its proverbial bones to the editing room floor, and attempted to move on to whatever flashy news item is grabbing people today.

We highly doubt many Americans even remember the furor ginned up over the holiday break, when President Obama began floating former Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel's name as a potential cabinet replacement for Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta.

The vitriol that was lobbed at Hagel over the holidays came from both the left and the right, and even included a trashy television commercial by a political lobbying group that favors a certain political party in Israel. Many were saying that that Sen. Hagel's chance to serve the President was all washed up, and that the President hung Hagel out to dry, by not loudly standing up and defending him.

That might have been common political wisdom in another era - but we're not so sure it'll work with Obama and Hagel.

To begin with, those who say President Obama hasn't defended the idea of Hagel serving as Defense Secretary obviously didn't pay attention to the news over the holiday break. The President specifically made a spirited defense of Hagel in his 'Meet The Press' interview just four days ago.

Obama acknowledged that some of Hagel's positions on Israel and Iran worry some members of Congress, and that the President was aware of Hagel's past comments about homosexuality and his apology, but that Hagel "…at least deserves a hearing and an opportunity."

What President Obama was obliquely referencing was the media trial, conviction, and political lynching of another potential second term nominee, Susan Rice.

As we pointed out on Wednesday - and as few other media organizations reported, even during our holiday break - the Senate report on the attack at the consular substation in Benghazi, Libya came back over that holiday break. The report found that while the FBI, CIA, and other so-called intelligence agencies were responsible for the explanations Ms. Rice gave of Benghazi, neither she or the White House were responsible for any political maneuvering, let alone lying about the Libyan incident.

Even though Susan Rice was innocent of all the smears and accusations slung at her, we'd be willing to bet all the money in our bank accounts, versus all the money in the pockets of Ms. Rice's critics, that you will never see, hear, or read an apology by any of those in Congress or the media who had crucified Susan Rice just two or three months ago - unless of course, UN Ambassador Rice decides to sue the hell out them for slander.

Instead of apologizing for their previous rush to judgement, or following up on the Benghazi Senate report, some of our less-than-competent colleagues in the "news" media spent much of their holiday insinuating that Secretary of State Clinton's blood clot (and earlier head injury) was a ruse to get out of testifying to Congress.

In light of the mainstream media's embarrassing failure to get the Benghazi story right, or even follow up on the accusations against Susan Rice, we suggest that our media colleagues hang up the idea that Chuck Hagel is all washed up as a candidate for Defense Secretary.

It's obvious that when it comes to credibility and media ethics, some of those we share our industry with are the ones who are truly all wet - and it's they who should be hung out to dry.

Some Things Change. Others? Don't.

Sometimes the hardest thing to do is begin. Since 2013 has already begun, however, you shouldn't have that problem today.

In case your favorite calendar app suddenly stopped working, or the bank forgot to give you your annual calendar, today is January 2nd, 2013, the first real workday of the new year. If you were hoping the world would end so you wouldn't have to go to back work, we're sorry to spoil things for you, but the Mayan prophecy was wrong.

We hope you had a safe, enjoyable holiday break, filled with family and friends, as we did. Even though the holiday season is generally a slow time for news, this year it was even slower than usual.

Sure, there was yesterday's heartbreaking - if not predictable - Husker football bowl game performance. The melodrama of the fiscal cliff also appears to be over - at least temporarily - after the childish and dangerous temper tantrums of the extremist Republicans in the U.S. House gave way to a deal that no one is truly happy about.

There was also the ridiculous "press conference" by Wayne LaPierre of the NRA during the holiday break, which added nothing productive to the gun safety debate in America. As usual, LaPierre and the NRA's idea of putting armed guards in schools is preposterous, when you consider most school districts in the U.S. don't even have enough money to pay their teachers properly.

If we can't afford to pay teachers, how could we ever afford to pay armed guards - let alone the increased insurance costs to each school.

For better or worse, not much truly changed during the 2012 holiday break this year, though we have a strong suspicion that was only the calm before a storm of changes in 2013.

For one thing, it's obvious to anyone honest that the Republican Party is at war with itself. After 'the worst year ever' for the tea party in 2012, according to some political pundits, we have a feeling the tea party extremists will do one of two things in 2013. Either they will succeed in splitting the GOP this year, or they'll finally be put back under their rocks by those Republicans who are sick of the extremist's obstruction. Our sources tell us that much of the political action - and conflict - this year may also be at the state level, as the tea party extremists retreat back into their local communities. From what we've researched, in many, many regions around the country, the tea partiers' local neighbors really don't want their extremism at home, either.

We also believe it's likely there will be some further change in the national attitude towards more effective gun safety laws. Thankfully, President Obama and Vice President Biden don't appear to be letting that topic disappear down the media memory hole. As Paul made clear last month in his cartoons, we're not necessarily counting on any new gun safety legislation actually passing - but we're now certain that lack of passage won't be because of neglect of the issue from the White House.

One thing that won't change this year is our commitment to you.

Our expanded focus over the last year, from politics to sports and entertainment was one you embraced - so we're keeping our focus broad this year. Our general aversion to horserace politics was also appreciated in 2012 - so we've decided we're keeping that too. Our complete daily archive - accessible along the right hand side of the Daily Commentary - was another addition last year, and will also continue in 2013.

As we noted already today, we don't think news in 2013 will be anything like the nearly frozen 2012 holiday period. It will likely be a storm of changes - one that we'll be happy to help guide you through, as we have for many years now.

Happy new year - and welcome to 2013.