After President Obama lectured Republicans in a Washington, D.C. speech on the budget and as GOP leaders ripped the President in return on Wednesday, I received a message from a listener that sort of summed up the situation.
"Jamie, how do you swallow this stuff every day?"
I will admit, some days, it is a challenge.
Yesterday was a perfect example, as everyone pretty much knew what they would say and where the day would go, hours before the President delivered his speech at George Washington University.
Democrats limbered up by using the House GOP budget plan of Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as a verbal punching bag, focusing some of their fire on major reforms in Medicare.
"The Tea Party wants to end Medicare," said Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) on the Senate floor. "That's the bottom line."
GOP leaders meanwhile hammered on news that the President would advocate raising taxes, and when the White House revealed that the Obama plan would bring in $1 trillion in new revenues, the gloves were taken off.
"I'm very disappointed in the President," said Rep. Ryan, who jabbed at the President by labeling his speech "excessively partisan."
"What we heard today was not fiscal leadership from our commander-in-chief; we heard a political broadside from our campaigner-in-chief," Ryan added.
While Republicans gave the speech a thumbs down, some did note that they have succeeded in moving the debate towards the Right.
"Clearly the President realizes that the national debt and the deficit is of critical importance to the economic health of this country," said Rep. Frank Lucas (R-OK).
But Lucas and others also noted that the President's plan might not add up.
Of the $4 trillion in savings, $2 billion comes from spending cuts.
Another $1 trillion is from lower interest payments on the debt. (I always get a little skeptical when lower interest payments are used for savings. The other one I furrow my brow at is claims of savings from "waste, fraud and abuse.")
The final $1 trillion comes from higher taxes, in the form of letting the Bush tax cuts expire on the wealthy and limiting their deductions.
Both of those plans have been offered twice before by this President, and both times the Congress refused to approve those plans.
Mr. Obama also said that Vice President Biden will convene talks in May with Congressional leaders - a budget summit of sorts - with the idea of cutting a deal by the end of June.
In the current partisan environment, that would be a major accomplishment.
Today the President meets with the leaders of a special deficit commission that he appointed last year.
When they produced their final plan, Mr. Obama said little about it and made clear he was not going to endorse the results.
But now, the ground has shifted somewhat politically.
Whether it means there might be a deal, that still seems a longshot.
