Coming up Wednesday
Franklin Graham: President Obama needs our prayer on North Korea crisis
Evangelist Franklin Graham weighs in on the North Korea crisis and how the U.S. should respond to threats.
[TRANSCRIPT TO COME]
Rep. King: President Obama's Middle East trip a success
Rep. Peter King (R-NY) on President Obama's first presidential visit to Israel and talks of a renewed peace plan.
Sen. Bill Nelson: Obama's immigration plan 'right on track'
President Obama laid out his plan to fix immigration at a stop in a majority Hispanic high school in Las Vegas yesterday, offering his support for many of the ideas laid out by the Senate's "Gang of Eight" in a bipartisan reform proposal.
On Starting Point this morning, Senator Bill Nelson calls the president's plan "right on track" and says that there's "very little difference" between the two proposals.
However, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Florida), who has been instrumental in crafting the Senate's plan, issued a warning to Obama yesterday, insisting that he's "not going to be part of a bidding war to see who can come up with the most lenient path forward."
When asked about this statement, Nelson, a Florida Democrat, urges Soledad to "give [Rubio] a break."
"I think he’s going to give a lot of cover to the Republicans who otherwise would choke on this," Nelson says.
Bill Clinton's fmr. chief of staff weighs in on Hillary's potential 2016 run
(CNN) – President Barack Obama said Hillary Clinton will go down "as one of the finest secretaries of state" as he sat next to her in their first joint interview Sunday night on CBS's "60 Minutes."
"The main thing is I just wanted to have a chance to publicly say 'thank you,'" he said when asked why he wanted to do the interview with his former political foe.
Bill Clinton's former White House Chief of Staff Thomas "Mack" McLarty, who has known the former president since kindergarten, weighs in on the rare interview on Starting Point this morning, saying that the "genuineness of their relationship came through."
"They work together. I think they've had an extraordinary run at it in terms of foreign policy," McLarty says. "I think Secretary Clinton has supported the president and reestablished our standing around the world. I think they've managed some exceedingly complex, fast moving and difficult situations in a very skilled manner.”
Regarding Clinton's potential 2016 presidential run, McLarty notes that four years is a long time.
“Right now she needs to take some time for rest, reflection and renewal. I think she’ll make decisions as they become timely before her," McLarty says.
FRC's Peter Sprigg disagrees with Obama's comparison of gay rights to civil rights, says 'homosexuals have all the same civil rights as anyone else'
During his 18-minute inaugural speech on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, President Barack Obama used the platform of his swearing in ceremony to frame his second-term agenda.
The president also laid out an ambitious vision for the future regarding the advancement of gay rights, tolerance toward illegal immigrants, preserving social welfare programs, and stopping climate change. This morning Peter Sprigg, a senior fellow at the Family Research Council, joins “Starting Point” to weigh in on the inaugural address.
Sprigg says he liked that President Obama began his speech with a quote from the Declaration of Independence, “and was attempting to root it in the principles of our nations founding.” On the other hand, Sprigg says he was not sure Obama “went on to correctly interpret what those principles mean for today.”
Sprigg adds that social conservatives like himself “do not agree with the president’s attempt to link the modern homosexual movement with the women’s right’s movement or the civil rights movement for African-Americans.” He says “homosexuals already have all the same civil rights as anyone else – but the fact that all people are created equal as individuals does not mean all sexual behavior is equal or that all personal relationships have an equal value to society at large.”
Poet Richard Blanco on making history at inauguration: It was an 'incredible honor'
Inaugural poet Richard Blanco on being the first Hispanic and openly gay poet to read at a presidential inauguration. This morning on "Starting Point." Blanco talks with Soledad O'Brien on what it was like to make history.
"It is an incredible honor," Blanco says. "I do feel in some ways that the inaugural poem is something that is sort of a continuum or there's something to be said about what each poem says about where America is in that moment and place and time. And so I wanted to pay sort of honor to the poets that had come before me as well."
See more from the interview in the clip above.
How will history judge President Obama's second inaugural speech?
Presidential historian Doug Wead weighs in on President Obama's second inauguration.
The lighter side of President Obama's second inauguration
"Early Start" co-host John Berman highlights the run moments of President Obama's second inauguration.
Bernice King: 'The fact that the President is using daddy's bible is heartwarming to me'
For just the second time, the inauguration intersects with Martin Luther King Jr. day. A number of events will be commemorating the civil rights icon through the day.
This morning on "Starting Point," Soledad O'Brien talks with Bernice King, daughter of Martin Luther King Jr. She explains why it will be especially poignant when President Obama takes the oath for his second term on her father's bible today.
Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) talks fiscal cliff standoff: 'problem...can't be shifted onto the middle class'
The countdown continues with just four days to go. Not just to New Years Day, but to the day the country falls over the fiscal cliff—unless leaders in Washington can reach a deal to avoid it. Key lawmakers will attempt to do that in a high-stakes meeting later today at the White House. President Obama is meeting with the four congressional leaders—Boehner, Pelosi, Reid and McConnell—at 3:00 p.m. Eastern. But the rhetoric is only getting more angry and disconnected in these final moments. Senator Debbie Stabenow, Democrat from Michigan, joins “Starting Point” with more live from D.C.
Sen. Stabenow believes that there is more bipartisan talk in the Senate than in the House. “We're having a lot of very important, very good, positive conversations between Democrats and Republicans, I believe the president does. The tough part is in the House, where they have taken this very extreme position about protecting the wealthiest Americans at all costs, even holding middle class families hostage to do it. And that really isn't rhetoric,” Sen. Stabenow says. “That’s what we're seeing over and over again. We have one bottom line, and that is when we get all done, we gotta solve the problem and can't be shifted onto the middle class one more time. Other than that, we want to sit down and continue to solve it.”
Latest Videos
