Sunday School 1/31/16

Time for today's edition of Sunday School, an overview of who some of the talking heads were talking to, and what they were talking about.

Chuck Todd and the gang at Meet the Press talked with, among others, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio. Cruz, who has tried to keep hold of the 'real conservative' mantle, summed everything up like this:

You know, the most common sentiment you hear from people is they're frustrated with Washington. They're frustrated with politicians. They say one thing and do another. We can't get burned again. And that frustration, the reason I see conservatives uniting behind our campaign, is they're looking for a consistent conservative. Someone they can trust to be a fiscal conservative, a social conservative, and a national security conservative. 

Rubio, for his part, tried hard to explain that it's OK to work with people to get things done.

I think voters understand that to solve problems, it's going to take the ability to work with people that you don't agree with on a bunch of other issues. But we're not going to compromise on principles... So I think if there's a chance to work together, and you don't have to betray your principles, you work together. And that's why we have elections and debate and all those sort of things in America. 

On Face the Nation, you can hear more from Rubio and Trump, who was also interviewed and actually said something policyish on Fox News Sunday.

Wallace: ...sir, are you saying that if you become president, you might try to appoint justices to overrule the decision on same-sex marriage?

Trump: I would strongly consider that, yes.  

On ABC's This Week, former Clinton confidant George Stephanopoulos had Hillary (with her NY Times endorsement) and Bernie Sanders talking about electability. First, Clinton:

Well, look, I'm a progressive who think it's important to actually make progress. That's what I've done my entire life. That's what I'll do as president. 

Obviously, I have big goals (and proceeds to list them). I have big goals. And I tell you how I'm going to get there and how I'm going to pay for them. And I think that is what the Americans want. I'm not going to sit here and over-promise and under-deliver. I'm going to tell you what I know we can achieve, and that's going to take the political system we have right now, and then I intend to bring in more people, as I always have, George...

So I understand politics. I understand a campaign. I am focused on my mission to make sure this country work for everybody, including hardworking middle-class families who rightly feel they've been left behind. I think I know how to do that, and I think the voters know that I know how to do that.

Sanders, asked by Stephanopoulos how he would respond to Clinton's comments, answered:

I respond to it by saying that every proposal that I am bringing forth is, in fact, supported by the vat majority of the American people. The problem is, is that Congress is so dominated by big money interests, they are much more concerned about campaign contributions than they are about the needs of working families. 

And what I am saying is that, yes, the United States should join the rest of the industrialized world, guarantee health care to all people, have paid family and medical leave, make public colleges and universities tuition-free, create millions of decent paying jobs by rebuilding our infrastructure.  

These are not radical ideas, George. And demanding that the wealthiest people and the largest corporations in this country start paying their fair share of taxes, that we break up these large Wall Street conglomerates - these are not radical ideas.

This is what the American people want. 

The last word today goes to Tom Brokaw who, talking about the Republicans, managed to sum things up quite well.

I really think a big piece of what Donald Trump has going for him is the celebrity culture that we live in in America. And he is everywhere, he comes in with that big airplane, and people say "I'd like to have a little piece of that."

Here's a guy running strongly among evangelicals, been married three times, he had affairs around the world with other people, he went broke a couple of times. They blow right through that. So we're playing in a different ballpark this year.  

Indeed, we are.  And Iowans will tell us all about that tomorrow night.