wants 250 or below. before the election, you mean? i mean, first of all, i have trouble seeing the senate pass that, frankly, they need to pick up 19 democrats, republicans, when i think that becomes difficult. the president though, what s interesting to me, you ve had nancy pelosi leave the door open. the president has at least twice by my count left the door open. he s not said he s going to veto this, which i think gives some indication that he knows, he doesn t want to be flexible about it, but he might have to be flexible about it. i mean, his spokesman said something like, i don t think it will come to that. he ll have to whip out the veto pen, but i can t see him really doing that. and vetoing this if it comes to that. both sides are holding hostage here. in the end if obama has a bill which would include the cuts for everybody, i m not sure he could veto it and survive politically. bret: up next, we ll talk about the pope s visit to great britain. you can still vote in
holdings of u.s. treasury debt in july edging up to 846.7 billion dollars, the increase came after two months of declines. meantime, the obama administration is vowing to take a tougher stance with china on trade issues. treasury secretary timothy geithner says china must move faster for the rise of the u.s. dollar. a senate ratification for a nuclear arms treaty with russia. the new start as it s called seeks to shrink the streak warheads by about a third and change some procedures by inspecting each country s arsenals and compliance. the treaty heads for a vote. the united kingdom where the pope is speaking towards the growing trend toward secularization and making the case that religion is of benefit to the world. the poll, the question tonight, how concerned are you about the secularization of society? you can text your answer to
accomplish on this trip? well, i think he is in touch with reality enough to know that four days in the u.k. is not going to magically turn the corner on the sex abuse crisis or in centuries of secularization. i think what he wants to do is reintroduce christianity and reintroduce the catholic church, a positive key to the public defined by his hostility to the catholic church. if he can convince people to take a new look, i think he would be willing to take that and run back to rome. kind of a big mission there, but sounds like a baby step as well. a reintroduction, as you put it so eloquently. talk to you again soon. we have been reporting on the pope s visit and his admission that the church s response was slow and insufficient to the
holdings of u.s. treasury debt in july edging up to 846.7 billion dollars, the increase came after two months of declines. meantime, the obama administration is vowing to take a tougher stance with china on trade issues. treasury secretary timothy geithner says china must move faster for the rise of the u.s. dollar. a senate ratification for a nuclear arms treaty with russia. the new start as it s called seeks to shrink the streak warheads by about a third and change some procedures by inspecting each country s arsenals and compliance. the treaty heads for a vote. the united kingdom where the pope is speaking towards the growing trend toward secularization and making the case that religion is of benefit to the world. the poll, the question tonight, how concerned are you about the secularization of society? you can text your answer to
has in some ways been a part of and in some ways tried to confront. sure, and he addresses those. he addressed them on the way to great britain about the scandals, the saying about the priests that he called the perverse practice of child abuse that folks who were involved in that, just take a quick listen to him addressing this. it s also a great fact that the authorities of the church were not sufficiently vigilent and quick and incisive in taking the necessary measures. so this pope obviously has to deal with that specifically, steve. but there is a broader message, as charles was talking about, about secularization. is america becoming more secular than we were as a country before? i don t think there s any question. i mean, it s not just that america is becoming more secular, it s that america, that we don t talk about religion in public life the way that we used to 30 years ago, the way that we used to 50 years ago.