i'm joined from washington by our deputy political director paul steinhauser. paul, thanks for coming in sunday night. let's look ahead to the new year and the new congress in a moment, but first this lame duck congress where nothing was going to happen. well, we had a flurry of votes there, and at the end who is getting credit for what was accomplished? i know we have new poll numbers. what do they reveal? >> well, a lot of political pundits saying it was a december to remember for president obama and why? because so many things were passed through that lame duck congress from the repeal of the don't ask, don't tell policy which prevented gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military to the ratification of the approval of a major nuclear weapons treaty with russia, to that tax cut compromise, and our polls indicate americans feel the same way, that it was the president who really was the winner. take a look at this. you mentioned our national survey and this is from cnn opinion research corporation. at the top right there, do you approve or disapprove of how these people handled the lame duck session? president obama, 56 so a majority approved of how he handled the lame duck and democrats and republicans disapprove. here's a reason why.