Obama Confident Deal Will Pass

Despite getting a middle finger from the House and hardly much more enthusiasm from the Senate on his deal with Republicans to extend all of the Bush tax cuts, President Obama says he is confident the deal will get through Congress. "Nobody—Democrat or Republican—wants to see people's paychecks smaller on Jan. 1 because Congress didn't act," he told NPR in an interview that aired Friday morning. The deal would extend tax cuts for all income brackets, lighten estate tax cuts, and extend unemployment benefits— all for the price of $868 billion. "Keep in mind, we didn't actually write a bill," Obama said. "We put forward a framework. I'm confident that the framework is going to look like the one that we put forward."