in washington a lot of these do baits are preordained even if it passes the house as james laid out it s pretty much dead on arrival in the senate. however, a big caveat, i think, while there is a lot of confidence at the white house and among senate democrats that the boehner bill is going nowhere fast; it s unclear that the reid bill did k. go anywhere slow or fast. come this weekend, if the reid bill isn t going anywhere, the boehner bill is still one of only two bills as james pointed out that has actually passed one of these two chambers. it will be interesting if despite all the veto threats over the boehner bill if it ever got to the president s desk and all the hammering about how much they don t like it, if it s the only legislative vehicle standing come sunday or monday dare i say the white house may have to deal with what s on the table or face a default on tuesday. we have a lot more baseball yet to be played. let s put it that way. james, when you see how this played out
he waited until boehner took his best shots, how many of them there were, and now is he going to try to counter punch. he waited very long to do. this he will could have had his own plan, his own bill in the senate any point along the way here. he took a few shots, now is he going to try to take his best shot. laura: is ed henry with us at the white house? yes. laura: are the white house watching this? are we going to get any file photos of the family watching this vote? i mean, is it that dramatic there or are they off doing something else? not that dramatic. they are keeping an eye on it but they are not watching minute by minute per se because they realize that this is just the prelude to the real battle that s going to happen this weekend. they are essentially the boehner bill will now be used by senate majority leader harry reid as the underlying vehicle legislatively to make dramatic differences between the reid and boehner bill. to use james analogy and
bring to a close a debate on the reid motion to concur in the house amendment to s 627 with an amendment numbered 589. bret: what is happening here on the senate floor, we just had a vote on the boehner bill, it passed with a vote of 59-41. they only needed a simple majority of 51. it s interesting that the number was 59 because it is short of what is the normal number needed for vote like this. which is 60. this was a special motion made by senate majority leader harry reid. it passes now. the boehner bill is tabled. this means that the boehner bill is put aside. but just to explain, they are not killing that bill. they are going to use that bill as the vehicle by which they re going to send back a compromise that we still don t know the details of. we expect that that will be formed over the next day, and be sent back on the boehner bill but they will scrap out all the
injected in this bill and now it s in the hands. not going to pass. laura: shell vehicle, right? laura, the problem is that the balanced budget is not it s timing. there has never been a balanced budget amendment that could pass any congress when the republicans controlled congress they couldn t pass it. laura: i didn t say it was probable. i m talking about the tactical advantage and who is actually looking like they want structural form. we know alan and lanny, do we not that this president would never be talking about this issue of whether to raise the debt ceiling or not or whether to cut spending or not. he wouldn t be talking about this if it weren t for these republicans who held firm. do you disagree with that? i disagree with what the country is seeing in washington. not seeing what you are saying. they are seeing tactics at the expense of the public interest. and i think there is disgust with party leadership on both sides here, laura. and for them to bring up a b
and for our country. what is running through his mind what s the exit here if the senate passes something and the houses no and the clock ticks to midnight. i think there is probably a serious look at the 14th amendment. i m not sure what other alternatives there are, if that s what it comes down to, laura. laura: alan, looking at the poll numbers, we talked to ed henry and james rosen about this earlier. the president, gallup has him at his lowest point 40% approval. and losing ground among generic matchup with generic republican candidate. this is not maybe helping the republicans this debate but also not helping the president. hurting the republicans more. of the problem the republicans have when they actually name a candidate that s when they are in trouble. the president will do well especially if he takes strong action and if he has continue to vehicle the 14th amendment, i think people will see this. most people want this involved. they want it done. they want a deal. an