That went nowhere fast.

President Obama laid out nearly two dozen proposals, promises, and calls for Congress to act Tuesday night in his fourth State of the Union address. But his speech was met by a brick wall of Republican opposition.

"An opportunity to bring the country together instead became another retread of lip service and liberalism,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said. “For a Democratic president entering his second term, it was simply unequal to the moment.”

Despite President Obama’s subtle reference to wanting to reform Medicare during the State of the Union address, McConnell accused Obama of catering to his base, and dismissed the speech as “pedestrian” and “liberal boilerplate.”

“Following four years of this president's unwillingness to challenge liberal dogma, we got more of the same,” McConnell said.

That echoed House Speaker John Boehner’s charge yesterday that the president didn’t have “the guts” to challenge his base and make spending cuts to fix the budget.

Asked if Democrats on the Hill would be willing to entertain cuts to Social Security and Medicare, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) said on MSNBC Wednesday, “Absolutely not.”

McConnell rejected Obama’s call for increased infrastructure spending and his push on climate change, instead noting that Obama didn’t mention the Keystone Pipeline or coal, which he called “proven and reliable.”

"The president spoke about energy infrastructure but didn't mention the Keystone pipeline,” McConnell said. “He chose the nation's biggest stage to promote something that's inefficient and costly, like solar panels, instead of something that's proven and reliable - and domestically produced - like coal.”

Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

John Boehner answers questions at the Republican Party Headquarters on Capitol Hill February 13, 2013 in Washington, DC.

McConnell and House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) also dismissed Obama’s call to increase the minimum wage to $9 an hour. It’s something Obama said was necessary given that someone working full time at $7.25 an hour, the current minimum wage, would only make $14,500 a year. The minimum wage has been flat since 2009.

"He spoke of workers' minimum wages, instead of their maximum potential,” McConnell said.

“When you raise the price of employment, guess what happens? You get less of it,” Boehner told reporters Wednesday. “At a time when American people are asking, ‘Where are the jobs?’ why would we want to make it harder for small employers to hire people.”

He added, “Our goal is to get people on that ladder and help them climb that ladder so they can live the American dream. And a lot of people who are being paid the minimum wage, are being paid that because they come to the workforce with no skills, and this makes it harder for them to acquire the skills they need in order to climb that ladder successfully.”

NBC's Kelly O'Donnell and Frank Thorp contributed to this report.

Obama’s two speeches in one… First part was your typical SOTU; second part was emotional plea to curb gun violence… Obama on the economy, sequester… President also unveils laundry list of economic/educational proposals… Obama heads to Asheville, NC to deliver speech at noon ET… On Rubio’s tough assignment last night and on whether he expanded his party’s appeal… And yesterday’s vitriolic day at the Senate Armed Services Committee.

*** Obama’s two speeches in one: Perhaps the best way to view President Obama’s State of the Union address last night was a tale of two speeches (actually, you could even argue three speeches if you count the sequester portion, which we discuss below). The first part was your traditional State of the Union -- domestic policies proposed, praise for America’s resiliency, and recognition of the country’s military service members. As he did in his inaugural address, Obama also called for comprehensive immigration reform and efforts to combat climate change. But it was the second part that was something you don’t often see in a State of the Union -- an emotional conclusion in talking about his proposals to curb gun violence that ended up overshadowing the rest of the speech. Recognizing the parents of a slain Chicago teenager who performed at last month’s inauguration, Obama said, “They deserve a vote [in Congress].” He continued, “Gabby Giffords deserves a vote. The families of Newtown deserve a vote. The families of Aurora deserve a vote. The families of Oak Creek and Tucson and Blacksburg, and the countless other communities ripped open by gun violence –- they deserve a simple vote.” It was powerful stuff, and a reminder that the gun debate (as well as the emotion that goes with it) isn’t going away anytime soon. Yet with Obama asking simply for a vote, it was also a reminder that passing anything won’t be easy. It was actually a fairly low bar for success that the president set. 

Jason Reed / Reuters

President Barack Obama delivers his State of the Union speech on Capitol Hill in Washington, February 12, 2013.

*** Obama on the economy, sequester: The top of the president’s remarks were focused on the economy and the ongoing debate over the budget.  Obama warned that the so-called sequester -- the automatic spending cuts set to take place March 1 -- would hurt the economy. “These sudden, harsh, arbitrary cuts would jeopardize our military readiness,” he said. “They’d devastate priorities like education, and energy, and medical research. “They would certainly slow our recovery, and cost us hundreds of thousands of jobs.” He also noted that Congress had already reduced the deficit by more than $2.5 trillion, and he laid out proposals to curb Medicare spending. And he called for Congress to work together to resolve the budget issues. “Let’s agree right here, right now to keep the people’s government open, and pay our bills on time, and always uphold the full faith and credit of the United States of America.” Buried in this speech is something that the president didn’t want to advertise, but that was placed in there as a hint to Republicans at where he’s ready to compromise on the deficit: He called for cuts to Medicare equal to what Bowles-Simpson proposed. He never said the number (not popular politically), but he stated the goal. Folks, this is where the compromise in March could happen.  

*** The laundry list of proposals: After opening with sequester and trying to frame the upcoming budget fights on his terms, the president then laid out a series of new initiatives. Universal pre-K. Infrastucture projects. Better training high-school students for technical jobs. Raising the minimum wage to $9.00 per hour. And creating a bipartisan commission to expand voting rights. We’re already hearing many Republicans dismissing these proposals as small bore. And, yes, we had Clinton flashbacks ourselves (remember the school uniforms?). But we’d note that this is a potential trap for the GOP. These are items -- especially the ones on education -- that many Americans care about, and they test REALLY WELL in polls. Republicans may want to claim all the ideas together are “liberal” and “big government,” but individually, these ideas poll test through the roof. They are 65% ideas, not 50%-50% ones. Today, Obama heads to Asheville, NC to begin selling his State of the Union with a speech at noon ET. (There, per the White House, he will tour a local factory to highlight the manufacturing policies he unveiled last night.) Tomorrow, he goes to Atlanta, GA. And on Friday, it’s to Chicago.

*** Rubio’s tough assignment: As we wrote last week, giving the State of the Union response hasn’t always been the best stepping stone to higher office. And with Marco Rubio’s response last night, we saw why. While the president gets to address a packed Congress and recognize individual citizens sitting in the audience, the responder often speaks to an empty room or office. While the president gets applause and opportunities for TV camera cutaways (and thus maybe a chance to take a swig of water), the responder looks straight into the camera with no one else there and with no chance for a break. That’s why the viral moment of Rubio gulping down water -- a moment he’s since joked about -- was so jarring. But even take away that water-gulping moment, Rubio’s speech shows you why the State of the Union response is such a tough assignment and one that’s fraught with peril. When it comes to music concerts, the main act is the final event. But the State of the Union is the only instance we can think of where the main act goes first and the side act is last.

*** Did he broaden the party’s reach? But here’s a separate question we have: Did Rubio broaden his party’s reach? While he’s younger than Mitt Romney and has a more relatable life story, Rubio’s speech was almost a rehash of almost everything we heard from Romney and the GOP in 2012. He accused Obama of believing that the free enterprise system is the source of America’s problems (when the president praised it in his State of the Union); he said that Obama wants to grow the size of the government; and he attacked the health-care law. All of those messages had hundreds of millions of dollars behind them in the 2012 presidential election, and Republicans got just 47% of the vote in the presidential election. There is no doubt that Rubio is a GOP politician with a bright future and plenty of personal appeal. But it also seemed like Rubio was preaching to the Republican choir rather than broadening the party’s reach. It’s a speech that is being very well received among conservatives, but was it a persuasion speech?

*** A vitriolic day at the Senate Armed Services Committee: Besides Obama’s State of the Union and Rubio’s response, the other big political event yesterday was Chuck Hagel’s nomination to be defense secretary passing through the Senate Armed Services by a party-line vote. But the actual vote got overshadowed by something else. The New York Times: “At times, the meeting slipped into an unusually accusatory and bitter back-and-forth, with Republicans like Ted Cruz, a freshman senator from Texas, going as far as to suggest that Mr. Hagel had accepted money from nations that oppose American interests. Saying that he had serious doubts about the source of payments that Mr. Hagel had accepted for speaking engagements, Mr. Cruz declared, ‘It is at a minimum relevant to know if that $200,000 that he deposited in his bank account came directly from Saudi Arabia, came directly from North Korea.’” That back-and-forth added fuel to the fire that the Senate is -- more and more -- turning into the more combative House of Representatives. On the other hand, with Democratic senators and even John McCain stepping in to rebuke Cruz (“No one on this committee should at any time impugn his character or his integrity”), it was a reminder that there’s a line you can’t cross in the Senate. Cruz is cementing himself as someone who doesn’t play by the old rules; that will make him popular with many non-Beltway conservatives. But he’s not making a lot of friends in the Senate (even among Republicans).

*** On the Hill today: The Senate Judiciary Committee holds a hearing on comprehensive immigration reform at 9:30 am ET, and Jack Lew’s confirmation hearing to be Treasury secretary takes place before the Senate Finance Committee at 10:00 am ET.

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President Barack Obama challenged Republicans on major tax and entitlement proposals in Tuesday's State of the Union address, unveiling sweeping new initiatives to boost the middle class while taking aim at GOP recalcitrance.

The president traveled to Capitol Hill on Tuesday for the annual speech, where he pressed Republicans to allow his proposals on issues ranging from taxes and entitlements to guns and immigration to move forward. While Obama seemed determined to advance his ambitious agenda, he must race against a window of opportunity that often closes quickly on presidents in their second terms. 

Moreover, the president's plans will have to survive the brier patch of Capitol Hill, where Republicans have strenuously opposed much of Obama’s agenda and are girding for a major springtime showdown on budgets and the swift, automatic spending cuts known as the sequester.

“Let's be clear: deficit reduction alone is not an economic plan,” said Obama, who argued that his second term priorities did not represent “bigger government,” but rather, “smarter government.”

Obama spent much of the first half of his speech challenging Republicans on that central issue after two years of legislating in Washington that saw the government lurch from the brink of a shut down to the brink of a debt-limit default to the brink of automatic tax hikes. 

“Let’s agree, right here, right now, to keep the people’s government open, pay our bills on time, and always uphold the full faith and credit of the United States of America,” the president said. 

The assertive rhetoric from Obama recalled the themes on which he successfully campaigned for re-election last fall. Tuesday’s speech mostly lived up to its billing by the White House as a coda to the liberal call-to-arms in Obama's second inaugural address on issues ranging from government spending to gay rights and immigration reform.

One issue on which Obama did not campaign -- stricter gun controls -- featured more poignantly in Tuesday's speech. Gun violence has unwittingly become a cornerstone of Obama's second term agenda following the elementary school massacre in Newtown, Conn. last December.

Gun control is an issue on which Obama faces stiffer Republican resistance, and the president took a much more personal tack in pressing lawmakers to take up his proposals. He turned victims of high-profile shootings in attendance at Tuesday’s speech in urging lawmakers to, at the very least, allow his gun proposals a vote.

"Gabby Giffords deserves a vote," he said, referring to the critically injured former Arizona congresswoman in the House chamber. "The families of Newtown deserve a vote. The families of Aurora deserve a vote. The families of Oak Creek, and Tucson, and Blacksburg, and the countless other communities ripped open by gun violence – they deserve a simple vote."

Obama’s speech on Tuesday was delivered in the same vein; the president embraced proposals that might encounter resistance in this Congress, such as new legislation to address climate change. But, in a reflection of Obama’s newfound feistiness in a second term, the president vowed to take executive action if Congress would not act.

Obama made other proposals he said would bolster the middle class. Among Obama’s proposals were: universal access to preschool for all four-year-olds, increasing the federal minimum wage to $9 an hour by the end of 2015, $50 billion in infrastructure spending, and partnerships to promote cleaner energy and improved manufacturing.

Those initiatives, the president pledged, should not increase the deficit “by a single dime.”

To help finance those initiatives, Obama called for broad individual and corporate tax reforms, as well as savings from entitlement programs like Medicare – changes to which have been a lightning rod in recent election cycles. Those proposals carefully track with Obama's previous demands to close loopholes and deductions to raise new revenue in tax reform.

But Republicans have argued that the matter of new revenue is “settled” following a fiscal cliff deal that saw the GOP relent to higher taxes on household income above $450,000. To that end, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, in the official Republican response, called on Obama to “abandon his obsession with raising taxes and instead work with us to achieve real growth in our economy.”

RELATED: Rubio to frame bitter tax, spending fights in humanizing terms

Obama’s ambitious plans come as he’s asking lawmakers to approve two other major proposals: comprehensive immigration reform that gives undocumented immigrants a pathway to citizenship, and a series of tighter controls on firearms as part of a broader effort to curb gun violence.

On immigration, the president lauded a bipartisan Senate group’s work on immigration.

Slideshow: State of the Union

Charles Dharapak / Pool / EPA

Click to see pictures from President Obama's State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress.

Launch slideshow

“As we speak, bipartisan groups in both chambers are working diligently to draft a bill, and I applaud their efforts,” he said. “Now let’s get this done. Send me a comprehensive immigration reform bill in the next few months, and I will sign it right away."

But for as much as fiscal matters and economic policy have dominated discussion in Washington, Obama devoted a good part of his State of the Union speech to foreign policy – highlighting in particular the planned withdrawal of 34,000 American troops from Afghanistan in the next year, a tangible symbol of how that war is winding to its end.

Obama also used his speech to address some of the emergent national security issues. He condemned North Korea’s nuclear test on Tuesday and pledged to work with Congress to develop rules for the use of unmanned aerial drones in targeting terrorists for assassination. The administration has faced new scrutiny on that latter issue amid the revelation of a new White House memo arguing that the president has wide latitude to target Americans for assassination if they’re deemed to be assisting terrorist actors.

Obama additional announced a new executive order to inoculate U.S. infrastructure from a cyber-attack, by enabling greater information-sharing between the government and its partners and calling for the development of a National Infrastructure Protection Plan within 240 days.

The event, as always, was filled with Washington pomp and circumstance, including lawmakers to arrived hours earlier to reserve prime seats for themselves. Also, in keeping with tradition, outgoing Energy Secretary Steven Chu was kept spirited away from the Capitol to ensure continuity of government in case of a security incident.

This story was originally published on Tue Feb 12, 2013 8:35 PM EST

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio will look to jettison Republicans’ caricature as a party of the rich in the official Republican response Tuesday to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address.

Recommended: Obama says Bolstering middle class must be policy 'North Star'

Rubio, the Cuban-American senator and a rising Republican star, will frame Washington’s bitter fights over taxes and spending in humanizing terms. His remarks seem firmly tied to the broader Republican effort to expand its reach and shirk the image of a GOP that has grown older, whiter and more dominated by men.

“Mr. President, I still live in the same working class neighborhood I grew up in. My neighbors aren't millionaires. They're retirees who depend on Social Security and Medicare. They're workers who have to get up early tomorrow morning and go to work to pay the bills. They're immigrants, who came here because they were stuck in poverty in countries where the government dominated the economy,” Rubio will say, according to English-language excerpts released by his office. (Rubio will also deliver a pre-taped response in Spanish.)

Mark Wilson / Getty Images

Florida Senator Marco Rubio speaks during the final day of the Republican National Convention at the Tampa Bay Times Forum on Aug. 30, 2012 in Tampa.

“Mr. President, I don't oppose your plans because I want to protect the rich. I oppose your plans because I want to protect my neighbors,” the Florida senator will add.

Rubio’s speech will also seize upon anemic U.S. economic growth in the fourth quarter of last year to argue that increased revenues would only stifle the sluggish recovery from the 2008 recession.

“Raising taxes won't create private sector jobs. And there's no realistic tax increase that could lower our deficits by almost $4 trillion,” Rubio will say. “That's why I hope the President will abandon his obsession with raising taxes and instead work with us to achieve real growth in our economy."

Recommended: Florida – the state to watch over the next four years

The Republican’s speech sets the stage for this spring’s fight over alternative Democratic and Republican budget proposals, both of which are tied into resolving the so-called “sequester” – the swift, automatic spending cuts that make up part of the “fiscal cliff.” Lawmakers delayed the onset of these cuts until Mar. 1, but lawmakers appear nowhere near a deal to avoid its effects, which would threaten to hamper economic growth and harm national security, according to the Obama administration.

Among other policy specifics upon which Rubio will touch are budgets and entitlement reforms. The first-term senator will call for ratifying a balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution – a proposal that has failed before in Congress – as well as changes to Medicare that would shore up the program’s solvency for future generations.

Updated 6 p.m. ET -- President Barack Obama was set to announce broad goal of reinvigorating America's middle class during his second term at Tuesday's State of the Union address, calling it the "North Star" that guides policy making in Washington in the immediate future.

 "A growing economy that creates good, middle-class jobs - that must be the North Star that guides our efforts," Obama would tell lawmakers in tonight's speech to a joint session of Congress, according to excerpts released by the White House. "Every day, we should ask ourselves three questions as a nation:  How do we attract more jobs to our shores?  How do we equip our people with the skills needed to do those jobs?  And how do we make sure that hard work leads to a decent living?"

 The top issues for Americans – jobs and the economy – were expected to be the central focus of Obama’s speech, the fourth formal State of the Union address he’s delivered since being elected in 2008. If the country’s struggles to emerge from a severe recession defined Obama’s first term, then the task of returning to the U.S. to a robust pace of growth was arguably the most urgent facing Obama as he enters his second term.

 Obama’s remarks are expected to focus on how to best help the middle class, particularly through investments in programs. The president was set to tell lawmakers these new plans were "fully consistent" with their past budget agreements and that, more importantly, they would not worsen a ballooned federal deficit.

 "Let me repeat - nothing I'm proposing tonight should increase our deficit by a single dime," Obama would say. "It's not a bigger government we need, but a smarter government that sets priorities and invests in broad-based growth."

 That emphasis comes against a spring budget battle between Obama and Republicans on Capitol Hill amid the looming threat of “sequester,” the automatic and swift spending cuts that the administration warns would cripple the economy and harm the national defense. The Jan. 1 fiscal cliff deal put off those cuts for two months, but Democrats and Republicans appear nowhere near a deal to avert the onset of those spending cuts in a few weeks.

 “It's pretty clear to me that the sequester's going to go into effect,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Tuesday on Capitol Hill. “I have seen no evidence that the House plans to act on this matter before the end of the month.”

 Related: At least four members of Congress already in seats for State of the Union

With the specter of sequestration hanging over tonight’s speech, Obama’s arguments on taxes, spending and entitlement reform will shape the contours of the fiscal fights in the weeks ahead. Perhaps the biggest open question heading into Tuesday’s speech was whether the president would be as forceful in making his case as he was during his second inaugural address. That speech – a liberal call to arms on the size of government, gay rights, immigration and beyond – was said by the administration to be intended to be paired with this State of the Union address.

Saul Loeb / AFP - Getty Images

President Barack Obama speaks during an Armed Forces Farewell Tribute in honor of outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta at Joint Base Myer-Henderson in Arlington, Va., Feb. 8, 2013.

Indeed, elements of that inaugural address are sure to feature prominently in tonight’s speech before a joint session of Congress. Obama has made a comprehensive immigration reform law that provides a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants a centerpiece of his second term agenda. The administration has also pushed for tighter regulations on firearms as part of a broader effort to curb gun violence. The fate of those measures is less certain.

Related: From rock stars, to CEOs and gun victims – a diverse guest list for State of the Union

Foreign policy will receive its due time, too, in Obama’s speech. The president is expected to announce that about half of the troops currently remaining in Afghanistan would return to the U.S. within the next year. Obama will almost certainly address Tuesday’s nuclear weapon test by North Korea during tonight’s speech, as well.

Marco Rubio’s rise within the Republican Party, just two years since his election to the Senate, has played out at head-spinning speed.

The 41-year-old, Cuban-American junior senator from Florida, has carefully navigated a choppy political environment in the two years since he was first elected.

And now the Republican rock star gets his moment in the spotlight when he delivers the official response to the State of the Union address delivered minutes earlier by President Barack Obama – another political rock star whose meteoric ascent invites inevitable parallels for Rubio.

Virtually every step of Rubio’s budding career has been scrutinized closely for what it might mean for his future political prospects. And after maintaining a deliberately low profile for much of his first 24 months as a senator, Rubio has begun to embrace the spotlight, including Tuesday’s coveted job of delivering the official Republican response to the president.

Nicholas Kamm / AFP - Getty Images

Sen. Marco Rubio speaks at the BuzzFeed Brews newsmaker event in Washington on Feb. 5, 2013.

The intense focus on Rubio reflects the speed of his ascendancy within the Republican Party, an institution in search of a new, compelling leader after losing two consecutive presidential elections by wide margins.

The State of the Union response is generally sought by political leaders hoping to increase their national profile, even though the slot is more often fraught with the risk of political misfortune.

“Marco has to articulate a clear and optimistic vision for growth in America but at the same time present a clear alternative to President Obama's call for a big, centralized government,” said Ana Navarro, a Florida Republican strategist.

But accomplishing that goal could be difficult, even for a well-spoken politician like Rubio.

“It's an opportunity to be seen and heard by the nation but you run the risk that if you bomb, it'll be on your tombstone,” Navarro said. “Marco is an eloquent speaker, an extraordinary orator. But this is the toughest gig in politics, by far. Following the president of the United States at the [State of the Union], which is full of pomp, circumstance and tradition, it's not an easy task.”

Rubio’s importance to the Republican Party is practically assumed at this point. When reports emerged in June that suggested Rubio had been left off Mitt Romney’s short-list of running mates, the GOP presidential nominee had to hastily stage a statement to declare that the Florida senator was being “thoroughly vetted” for the job.

Now, the Floridian has a chance to add another notch his burgeoning political belt.

Rubio has most recently shouldered the burden of selling a comprehensive immigration reform framework – which he helped craft as a member of a bipartisan “Gang of Eight” senatorial group – to skeptical conservatives.

He has made the rounds on conservative talk radio to talk-up the plan, which includes a proposal to give undocumented immigrants a pathway to citizenship. A similar plan earned President George W. Bush a rebuke from the right. But many of those same critics are now praising Rubio for his work, even if they haven't endorsed the proposal.

Rubio is expected to address immigration in his State of the Union response, but as part of a broader discussion about growing the economy and helping the middle class, according to an aide to the senator.

"He’ll explain why President Obama’s call for big government is bad for the middle class, and why limited but effective government will grow our economy and create jobs," the aide said.

Democrats are casting Rubio’s expected speech as little more than a rehash of staid Republican proposals.

“While the president will offer new ideas and an agenda for the next year to continue to grow our economy and broaden opportunity for the middle class, Sen. Rubio and the Republican Party – despite their desire to learn to be a ‘happy’ party that just needs to smile more – will continue to offer Americans more of the same failed policies that were rejected by the American people last November,” said Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee.

Indeed, part of Rubio’s task involves advancing a broader Republican effort to make the party more appealing to a changing electorate, especially after Obama won 71 percent of the Hispanic or Latino vote in his re-election bid last fall.

Rubio’s popularity in Republican circles is undoubtedly tied to his status as one of the most prominent elected Latino officials in either party. Rubio is writing the remarks himself, per his aide, and will deliver them in both English and Spanish – the first time the same person has delivered the official response in both languages.

(Rubio will tape the Spanish-language version beforehand, and deliver the English version live on national television.)

Still, Rubio’s rise – and, with it, the speculation about whether he’ll run for president in 2016 – comes well before the next election. There are plenty of pitfalls and challenges to sustaining momentum awaiting the Florida senator in the next few years.

But a scant two years of federal experience hasn't always been a limitation when a politician is eyeing the presidency a full four years out from the next election. Just ask Barack Obama.

Obama to focus on the economy in State of the Union… A reminder: As the economy goes, so goes Obama (and his second-term agenda)… The speech, politically, also will be a way to frame the sequester debate… Rubio’s chance in the spotlight… And the danger for Hagel: having his confirmation vote linger.

*** Focusing on the economy: President Obama’s inaugural address last month was billed as a call to action, as well as a not-so-subtle declaration that American politics had been transformed -- on the role of government, on gay rights, and on war. But tomorrow night’s State of the Union will have a slightly different focus, White House aides say, with Obama emphasizing the economy and revisiting the economic themes from his re-election campaign. The speech “will outline his plan to create jobs and grow the middle class by investing in people,” an administration official tells First Read, adding: “The president’s plan grows the economy from the middle out by investing in manufacturing, clean energy, education, and infrastructure.” Obama also will call on Congress to reduce the nation’s deficit and debt, including via entitlement reform, but he will say these cuts need to be balanced and not borne solely by the middle class. The White House always viewed his two big speeches in three weeks (the inaugural and State of the Union) as two bites at the bully-pulpit apple. And the same administration official calls the two speeches “two acts in the same play.” While the White House maintains they have been focused on the economy, tomorrow’s speech will put an end to the chatter (they hope) that they haven’t spent enough time TALKING about the economy.

Saul Loeb / AFP - Getty Images

President Barack Obama speaks during an Armed Forces Farewell Tribute in honor of outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta at Joint Base Myer-Henderson in Arlington, Va., Feb. 8, 2013.

*** A reminder: As the economy goes, so goes Obama (and his second-term agenda): Yet with Obama spending his political capital on his proposals to curb gun violence and reform the nation’s immigration system -- which he’ll also address on Tuesday -- reemphasizing the economy allows the president to return to the issue that remains the public’s top concern. After all, the unemployment rate, while down substantially from its high in 2009, is at 7.9%, and GDP contracted in the fourth quarter of 2012. And according to our national NBC/WSJ poll, only 36% of respondents said they were either “very” or “fairly” confident in Obama’s ability to promote a strong and growing economy. Remember, if the economy slows down, it makes it harder to get anything else done (like on guns or immigration).

*** Framing the sequester: Another way to look at Obama’s State of the Union is to frame the budget debate over the looming sequester -- that is, the automatic spending cuts (in defense and other programs) set to take place in March. As Politico writes, “President Barack Obama’s State of the Union speech will be less a presidential olive branch than a congressional cattle prod. Emboldened by electoral victory and convinced the GOP is unwilling to cut deals, Obama plans to use his big prime-time address Tuesday night to issue another broad challenge at a Republican Party he regards as vulnerable and divided, Democrats close to Obama say.” More: “Privately, administration officials see [the speech] as an extension of Obama’s unabashedly provocative and progressive Jan. 21 inaugural address, their latest attempt to leverage favorable deals on the sequester and the debt ceiling comparable to the watershed deal Obama secured on increasing taxes on the wealthy. Obama now hopes to use his post-election popularity to force new tax increases and fewer budget cuts on Republicans as part of any deal to avert a $1.2 trillion menu of automatic cuts increasingly likely to kick in on March 1.” This won’t be as easy as the fiscal cliff because Obama has got to get Congress to pro-actively stop it. And right now, House Republicans seem nearly unified on the idea of letting the cuts happen.

*** Rubio’s chance in the spotlight: In addition to Obama, there’s another person who will be in the spotlight on Tuesday night -- Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), who is giving the GOP response. This is a great opportunity for the potential 2016er. But as we noted last week, the State of the Union responder hasn’t been a great stepping stone for those looking to run for higher office. In fact, the last eventual party nominee to deliver the response was Sen. Bob Dole (R-KS) in 1996. And the last person to deliver one and go on to be president was Bill Clinton in 1985 when he was governor of Arkansas.

*** Do you have to let it linger? Finally, while it remains pretty clear that Chuck Hagel still has the votes to be confirmed as the president’s defense secretary, any day that goes by when there’s not a vote isn’t a good day for him. That said, Politico reports that the Senate Armed Services Committee could vote on Hagel’s nomination as soon as Tuesday, “but Republican aides reacted to that idea by suggesting that some members could walk out in protest.” Democrats and the Obama White House, if they want him confirmed, can’t let his nomination linger.Click here to sign up for First Read emails.

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Published at 5 a.m. ET: Less than one month into his second term, President Barack Obama looks to complete the outlines of an ambitious agenda in his State of the Union address Tuesday night.

In his inaugural speech, the president telegraphed several initiatives he wants Congress to pursue and pass this year: gun control legislation, a bill to create a legalization process for many of the nation’s illegal immigrants, subsidies for renewable energy technologies and legislation to respond to climate change.

Obama will likely return to those topics Tuesday night, but the White House has signaled that this speech will focus more on the themes that dominated the past four years -- jobs and the economy -- with new initiatives aimed at improving the prospects of growth for both, and a particular emphasis on the middle class.

But any new policies or programs will have a cost to both present and future taxpayers, and it will take some time to figure out that cost because the president hasn’t yet presented his budget proposal to Congress. And when he does, the ongoing standoff between Republicans and Democrats over everything from how to continue funding the government to looming spending cuts still leaves plenty of uncertainty about any fiscal policy in Washington.

Due a week ago, but not likely to appear until sometime next month, the president’s budget proposal is the detailed and lengthy (last year’s was 256 pages long) blueprint in which a president gives Congress and taxpayers all the specifics -- how much each new initiative will cost and what tax proposals he is offering to help to pay for his programs.

The budget document is the president’s attempt to direct spending policy for the coming fiscal year -- the one that starts on Oct. 1 -- and for the ten years beyond that.

This year there’s an air of unreality about the budget compared to, for instance, 2009 when the president’s Democratic allies controlled both the House and the Senate. Exactly four years ago, when Obama proposed to collect $646 billion in new revenues from auctioning off greenhouse gas emission allowances, there was a reasonable expectation that the proposal would become law and that the $646 billion would flow into the Treasury.

When Obama does deliver his budget proposal next month, the fiscal path forward will remain in an extraordinarily makeshift and unpredictable state.

Budget 'harder to predict' than ever
Veteran budget analyst Stan Collender wrote this week that even former congressional Budget Committee staffers who have spent their careers assessing budgets find that “the current situation is as complex, hard to read, and even harder to predict than any they’ve ever seen.”

The federal government is now operating on a six-month continuing resolution which keeps discretionary spending for departments and agencies at the prior year’s levels.

Mandatory spending for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and federal employee retirement benefits is driven by demographics, enrollment, and the cost of medical procedures. It isn’t as controllable by Congress or the president.

The continuing resolution expires on March 27, leaving Obama and Congress only a few weeks to figure out what to do next. Another stopgap continuing resolution seems quite possible.

In addition, the Budget Control Act requires $85 billion in spending cuts to begin on March 1.

Illustrating just how unreal the current fiscal situation is, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said in his farewell address last week at Georgetown University that if Congress passes another continuing resolution and it allows the spending cuts required by the Budget Control Act to take effect, then his department “will have to abruptly absorb in a period of about six months” $43 billion in spending cuts (known as the sequester). This will be on top of what Panetta thinks are inadequate spending levels in the continuing resolution -- what he described as “a $35 billion shortfall in operating funds for our active forces.”

Kevin Lamarque / REUTERS

President Barack Obama speaks from the briefing room of the White House in Washington Feb. 5, 2013.

Panetta explained that the Pentagon has been spending money at a relatively robust rate level so far this fiscal year. “We assumed, silly us, that we would get a 2013 appropriation, what we requested,” he said. “And so we're operating on this hope that 2013 appropriations bill will be passed. It hasn't been passed.” And yet the Defense Department has been spending money as if it would be passed.

With both the sequester and another continuing resolution looking possible, Panetta is now facing, and leaving his successor with, “a serious disruption in defense programs and a sharp decline in our military readiness.”

Reminding his audience how big an employer the Department of Defense is and how large an economic effect it has, Panetta said, “If sequester happens, let me tell you some of the results. We will furlough as many as 800,000 DOD civilians around the country for up to 22 days. They could face a 20 percent cut in their salary.”

Other departments and agencies would need to take similar steps.

Given such a crisis atmosphere, one could see why Obama’s proposals for new programs and new spending might get overshadowed and might stand little chance of being adopted.

Disaster spending
And yet Obama and members of Congress have been extremely lucky in one sense. The last few years has been a good time to be in charge of fiscal policy, thanks to ultra-low interest rates which mean an ultra-low cost of financing the federal government’s borrowing.

That will end in the next several years. The Congressional Budget Office, in its annual budget forecast last week, projected that what the federal government must spend on net interest payments will more than double in the next five years and will nearly quadruple by the end of the 10-year budget forecasting period. Instead of spending six cents of every dollar to pay interest on the debt, the government will be spending 14 cents of every dollar on interest payments in 2023. 

By 2020 the government will be spending more on interest than it will spend on national defense.

In the short term, the good news for Obama is that the economy is recovering and with that recovery has come a surge in federal tax revenues, which are up 12 percent in the first four months of Fiscal Year 2013. Individual income tax revenues are up by 16 percent so far in FY2013.

Keep in mind that revenue surge has come even before the full impact of the $700 billion tax increase that Obama signed into law on Jan. 2. The increased revenues from that tax increase will show up in withholding from paychecks in 2013 and also will be seen in the income tax payments Americans must make when they file their tax returns in April 2014.

Given the need Obama sees for even more revenues, don’t be surprised if you see some of the very same ideas in the State of the Union and the budget blueprint that he proposed back in 2009 in his very first budget proposal, such as taxing a form of investment income called “carried interest” as if it were ordinary income and eliminating of certain tax preferences for oil and gas firms.

But while some things might be the same as in 2009, in one part of the budget one thing is quite different: in Obama’s first budget proposal in 2009 he and his number-crunchers projected that in the current fiscal year, FY 2013, the federal government would need to spend $20 billion on disaster relief. That disaster spending prediction will turn out to be far short of reality: Obama has already signed into a law a disaster relief bill for Hurricane Sandy that will cost $50 billion -- and the hurricane season does not being until June 1.

President Barack Obama will deliver the first State of the Union address of his second term on Feb. 12, House Speaker John Boehner's, R-Ohio, office said Friday.

The speaker extended the customary invitation to the president to deliver the speech on Tues., Feb. 12., the birthday of President Abraham Lincoln.

Larry Downing / REUTERS

President Barack Obama hosts a bipartisan meeting with Congressional leaders in the Roosevelt Room of White House to discuss the economy in this file photo with Speaker of the House John Boehner.

Boehner wrote in his letter:

Our nation continues to face immense challenges, and the American people expect us to work together in the new year to find meaningful solutions. This will require a willingness to seek common ground as well as presidential leadership. For that reason, the Congress and the Nation would welcome an opportunity to hear your plan and specific solutions for addressing America’s great challenges. Therefore, it is my privilege to invite you to speak before a Joint Session of Congress on February 12, 2013 in the House Chamber of the U.S. Capitol Building.

Thank you for your consideration, and I look forward to your response.

Obama's speech is sure to include elements touching on the upcoming battle with congressional Republicans over taxes, spending and entitlements -- an outgrowth of the "fiscal cliff" deal at the beginning of this month. The president has also previously said that the recommendations from Vice President Joe Biden's gun violence task force would be part of his State of the Union speech.

As we wrote earlier today in First Thoughts, President Obama is likely to revisit several themes that he discussed in his first State of the Union address, like the economy and political civility.

We put together a montage of some major themes - and seminal moments - of previous State of the Union addresses.

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