68% of moderates have a favorable view of him. 60% of independents agree. and even 34% of conservatives say they do. so president obama has the american people behind him. what does that mean for his big second term agenagenda? let s bring in bob strum and cynthia tucker. bob, i m going to you first. he s at 60%. what will the republicans come up with now? well, there s a fundament fall political realignment underway in this country. and wliel obama realigns, the republicans are in decline. and they really have three choices. one of which they ve seenl to have already gotten rid of. secondly, they can destabilize the economy. that s what they tried to do for years moving up toward the 2012 election.
what does he do, bob? well, some deals are going to be made in the back room, frankly. if there s a fiscal cliff deal in the end, it s going to be boehner sitting there to sign onto what the president has proposed. but he s going to move forward with gun control. if you look at the numbers on that issue, if you ask people do you think there should be a lot more gun control, it s a very close question. should we close the gun show loophole? there are big majorities in favor of that. i think the president is going to put it in the state of the union message. i think republicans are going to be in real trouble if they block that. they re going to face the same problem on immigration reform. as we just heard, and i think it s a brilliant analysis, their brand is damaged.
surely they would change before they found themselves a third party or extinct. it does not appear they have yet gotten the message. maybe they will eventually, but it doesn t look like they ve gotten the message on taxes. i m not sure that they ve gotten the message on gun control, either. we ll see. you know, bob, the president recording to the new york times, he faces a critical choice. the agenda has changed and today the times says he s got to deal with whether he should tackle gunl reform in the next term.
this can t be personal. this has to be about policy. it has to be about what s best for the country. there s a job that has to be done. and americans stand behind what president obama is trying to do. a new poll shows the president s job approval ratings at 57%. the highest ratings since the death of osama bin laden. but only 11% of americans approve of what the congress is doing. 11%. americans believe in the president and are sick and tired of gop failures in congress. joining me now is bob strum, senior advisor to the kerry and gore campaigns and now a professor at nyu. and visiting professor of journalism at the university of georgia. thanks to both of you for being here tonight. glad to be here, rev. good to be here, reverend.
it didn t work for them in the election in november, but we are still committed to his failure. we are getting to see republicans who are still opposing the president on every term. and that is i think progressives may now have more realistic expectations about what obama can deliver. he was doing everything he possibly could and i think he will continue to do so in his second term. bob and cynthia, thank you both for your time tonight. thank you. coming up, the politics nation justice file.