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May 16, 2013 Republicans slammed Obamacare with a barrage of three-word tweets. But the White House trolled them in response.

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January 30, 2013 Federal spending cuts may have hurt the U.S. economy's fourth-quarter growth. But don't count on that changing the dynamics of the current debate over the sequester, the ax poised to start hacking $1.2 trillion from federal spending if Congress fails to stop it by the March 1 deadline.

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• Economy Shrank At 0.1 Percent Annual Rate In Fourth Quarter

January 10, 2013 After trying to help remove fellow Republican John Boehner as House speaker, Rep. Justin Amash got a very warm reception upon returning to his Michigan district. For a conservative Republican from a conservative district, being labeled a Washington troublemaker is not necessarily a bad thing.

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January 7, 2013 It's been a rough couple of weeks for John Boehner. He was all but shut out of the fiscal cliff deal, dissed by his own party, and suffered 12 GOP defections when re-elected as speaker. But did he emerge from all of this as a loser? It's not that simple.

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January 5, 2013 The framers of the Constitution didn't spell out all the responsibilities of the speaker of the House. In practice, one of those duties has been engaging in one-on-one negotiations with a president on important policy issues. But John Boehner says no more — even with new fiscal fights looming.

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January 3, 2013 By letting the House take up the Senate's fiscal cliff-dodging legislation that raises income tax rates on the wealthiest earners, Speaker John Boehner answered affirmatively a question that had been on many minds: Would he allow an up-or-down floor vote on a bill opposed by most fellow House Republicans?

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December 12, 2012 Despite his re-election and bolstered Democratic numbers in Congress, President Obama has far from a free hand to make a comprehensive deal with House Speaker John Boehner that would include cuts to entitlement programs. Strong resistance to that notion is coming from the political left — and with a warning.

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December 11, 2012 The offer from the speaker follows his remarks on the House floor in which he said the White House was slow-walking the process. Unless a deal is reached, automatic across-the-board spending cuts and sweeping tax increases are scheduled to go into effect at the first of the year.

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December 9, 2012 The closed-door meeting between the two men may be the first positive signs in days that negotiations may be moving forward. Meanwhile, a top Republican said Senate Republicans could agree to higher taxes on the richest Americans if it meant getting a chance to overhaul entitlement programs.

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December 8, 2012 Not long ago, it seemed that the House of Representatives was a case of the tail wagging the dog, with Speaker John Boehner unable to keep in line many fellow Republicans, especially freshmen who came to Congress riding the 2010 Tea Party wave. Now, however, the big dog seems back in control.

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December 3, 2012 Brinkmanship has long been a mainstay in Washington politics, and so it is still. Which is why it might be too early to give up hope that President Obama and congressional Republicans can reach a "fiscal cliff" deal despite how far apart the sides were Monday.

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December 1, 2012 Every student of Washington knows the Senate has become the definition of a legislative graveyard, in part because of the frequency with which the minority party invokes its right to filibuster legislation and nominations. The Senate majority leader may push to change that — which could make matters worse.

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November 28, 2012 In Washington's latest game of chicken, President Obama is recruiting voters who see things his way to provide an edge in his quest to get congressional Republicans to accept tax increases on the nation's wealthiest. His newest weapon? A Twitter hashtag.

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November 17, 2012 Fiscal experts at a Washington forum didn't agree on whether the "fiscal cliff" could be avoided. But they generally agreed that there wasn't enough time before the end of the year to resolve all the complex tax and spending issues that needed to be dealt with.

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November 9, 2012 The words from President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner on Friday over taxes and the fiscal cliff could be properly viewed as the two men staking out opening positions in coming negotiations. They also could be seen as addressing the two very different constituencies the men must answer to.

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