I was late in watching the President's New Year's Day remarks following the vote but I saw most of it. I had to pull up the White House website to catch it. I have to be resourceful with my total ban of television news. My fear is called punditaphobia which has progressed from my earlier Foxaphobia.
I had a political conversation with a Fox News watcher on a plane once. When I told her finally that I did not actually watch her heroes on Fox, or any TV news for that matter, she gasped. She asked me why I thought I was informed... I said, "I read."
It was highly impressed by the number of Republicans in the House that voted in favor of the cliff bill. The Senate Republicans had a clear reason to send a message to the House in large numbers, but the message back did not have to be a strong ditto, just a majority vote. This was seemingly a vote against Boehner who tried unsuccessfully to derail the process a number of times, in deference to the Fox teapublicans. House members were quite possibly voting against Boehner's actions of not allowing them to vote before now and almost not allowing them to vote today. This vote said "We side with reason, not the current leadership." It is time for Boehner to retire his position. It is obvious that everyone went over his head to get this done.
And I used to write "Speaker Boehner" in respect to his position. sigh
