Is the Senate too liberal to reach a deal on the fiscal cliff?

Democrats have beefed up their Senate majority with the election of some "unabashed progressives." Will that make compromise even harder on Capitol Hill?

Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)
(Image credit: Darren McCollester/Getty Images)

"The Senate is about to become a liberal lion's den," says Kate Nocera at Politico. Despite all the talk about Republicans taking back the majority there, Democrats actually gained seats, and the new gang includes "senators who ran their campaigns as unabashed progressives and won." The group is led by Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, "a hero of the left" who reclaimed the late liberal champion Ted Kennedy's seat from Republican Scott Brown. Warren, Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) will "strengthen a once-dwindling group of die-hard liberals" as they take their seats alongside newly reelected Democratic Sens. Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island.

Howard Dean might say these are the folks who belong to “the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.” They are pro-gay marriage, pro-union, favor tax increases on the wealthy and support Obamacare. In some ways, they are populist throwbacks — in the spirit of Paul Wellstone or Hubert Humphrey — who don't flinch from explaining the positive role that government can play in people's lives.

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