hasn t been great. it is important to note, though, that the context of this first year of president trump s term compared to the first year of obama s term, there are a lot i think that president obama in the beginning of 2009 had 60 seats or so in the senate and of course, mitch mcconnell does not have that many. and it s much tighter, which is why every single seat is important, every single voice in that republican caucus matters. so, seema, on top of daca, on top of tax reform, on top of everything else that we ve been talking about, there is sort of this looming thing, as well, which is a possible government shutdown. do you think that s going to happen? i don t think so. i think they will actually pull it together. and also, just to add on the mitch mcconnell front, i think one of the things that for eight years, republican voters were really angry at president obama. they don t have anybody to be angry at. they don t have anybody to be angry at, so now they re ang
clyburn saying if they have a good relationship, house speaker john boehner, the nominal boss, the actual boss within the house republican conference, if cantor and boehner have a good relationship, i d hate to see a bad one. for their part the two men say they are on the same page but in an hour just behind these doors here in the west wing of the white house they will go at it again, martin, for the fourth consecutive day. still, the same blocking points here, the same stumbling points. that is over taxes, how are boehner and cantor working together or working at cross-purposes, however they are working, going to overcome the absolute refusal of their conference, particularly the conservative base, not to raise tax nez any way, shape or form. who does the white house therefore feel it s negotiating with? is it eric cantor? is it speaker boehner or mitch mcconnell? who is the white house negotiating with? well, first of all, on the mitch mcconnell front, a very clever, creative wa