Media

The Hill - Russell Berman

Meeting with his conference for the first time since the election, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Wednesday told his troops to settle in for a long battle over the “fiscal cliff.”

“Sit back, this is going to take a while,” Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said in characterizing Boehner’s message at the closed-door meeting.

In once again electing a Republican House of Representatives, Democratic Senate and Democratic White House, the American people voted to maintain the status quo in Washington's balance of power. While the composition of the legislative and executive branches may remain the same, a continuation of current economic policies is not an option.

TIME Magazine - Michael Grunwald

The thing about an Etch A Sketch is that the picture never looks real. Mitt Romney‘s attempt to draw one self-portrait for the Republican primaries and a different one for the general election left voters unconvinced that he knew who he was. So how could they?

The Hill - Pete Kasperowicz

Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) is calling on Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to speed up the process of reforming the department's internal postal service to ensure that members of the U.S. armed forces get their absentee ballots on time.

The last unemployment report to be released before the election reiterates how far we have to go to reach pre-recession levels of prosperity. The 7.9 percent unemployment rate recorded for October is up slightly from September's 7.8 percent. Even more discouraging, it is slightly higher than the 7.8 percent recorded when President Obama first took office while the recession was at its peak.

POLITICO - Jake Sherman

As information continues to emerge about the September 11 terrorist attack in Libya, evidence has grown stronger that the Obama administration's response, both before and after the assault, was inadequate at best.