CNN 2011-01-05

I'm Carl Azuz. This is CNN Student News! It is my privilege to wish you a very happy new year. Welcome to our first show of 2011! We have 10 minutes of commercial-free headlines ready for you; they start right now!

Now, before we went on Christmas break, we talked about the status of three proposals being considered by the U.S. Congress. There's been action on all three of them. First, the tax cut deal. This was the compromise that President Obama and Republican leaders had worked out to extend a set of tax cuts for two years. That passed in both the House and the Senate, so everybody's taxes are going to stay right where they are for the next two years.

Next, "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." That's the policy that banned gays and lesbians from serving openly in the U.S. military. It's been in place since 1993, but Congress voted to overturn the policy, which means eventually, gays and lesbians will be able to serve openly.

Finally, START, a treaty between the United States and Russia that would limit how many nuclear weapons each country can have. The Senate has to approve these kinds of treaties, and it did. All of this was done during what's called a lame 2 duck session. That's what you call the time between an election and when those people who were elected take office.

The lame duck session is now over; the new Congress gets to work this week. Ed Henry gives us a preview of what they're going to be working on and how much debate we might have to look forward to.

To hear the president tell it, bickering 3 with the Republicans is so 2010.

A lot of folks in this town predicted that after the midterm elections, Washington would be headed for more partisanship 5 and more gridlock. And instead, this has been a season of progress. That's a message that I will take to heart in the New Year, and I hope my Democratic and Republican friends will do the same.

But with the Republican John Boehner taking the speaker's gavel, that rosy 6 scenario 7 will be tested immediately in 2011, because both parties will now have to agree on a long-term budget after kicking the can down the road on all those spending cuts the Tea Party was demanding and the president's own debt panel was proposing to no avail.

I expect we'll have a robust 8 debate about this when we return from the holidays. The debate that will have to answer an increasingly urgent question, and that is how do we cut spending that we don't need while still making investments that we do need.

With the federal cash register tapped out, it will be especially difficult to tackle the president's biggest challenge of all.

My singular focus over the next two years is not rescuing the economy from potential disaster, but rather jump-starting the economy so that we actually start making a dent 1 in the unemployment rate.

Mr. Obama also may face resistance to his economic plans from both liberals still smarting from the tax deal he just cut and conservatives determined 9 to repeal 10 his health reform law. An independant-minded Republican independent is urging both sides to give the new balance of power a chance.

Let's figure out how we deal with some of these very, very difficult issues, whether it's tax policy or whether it's going to be what we're going to be doing on spending. We've got enough that we need to do that we don't need to get weighted down in the partisan 4 politics.

Music to the ears of White House aides trying to hammer the message that Republicans now have a responsibility to govern.