It came down to a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday night, the Senate had already passed a temporary fix to the fiscal cliff, but the House had to approve that plan and for the president to sign it and to make it law. When the votes were counted, representatives have voted 257 to 161 to approve the plan. It’s not perfect. Many lawmakers don’t like it. For one thing, it does not reduce government spending, something that will need to get done in order to reduce the debt. It does raised taxes on families that make more than $450,000 a year. It’s the first federal income tax hike since 1993. And it does put off some other tax raises and automatic government spending cuts that would have happened if no agreement had been made, but if the government had done this for a grade, it wouldn’t be an A, it wouldn’t really be an F. It’s be an incomplete. Christine Romans explains why.

Part of the fiscal cliff was averted, but there are two big issues not addressed in the bill. The spending cuts or the sequester, that issue was delayed two months, Two, there’s nothing represent the debt ceiling in this bill either.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner says the government has officially reached its limit, its $16.394 debt limit. Some analysts are warning that the gridlock in Washington is what could caused as even worse, more problems. Steven Englander, CitiFX said, quote, “The process was so chaotic and the outcome so unsatisfactory, that we’re likely to see a further U.S. downgrade at some point.” All this drama in Washington could well put the breaks on Wall Street. Christine Romans, CNN New York.

Is this legit? Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution focuses on the power of the presidency. Em, not true, Article 1 is all about the powers of Congress.

There is new Congress in town, the 113th Congress of the United States, it’s getting started today. All 435 voting members of the U.S. House of Representatives were elected last November. Representatives serve two year terms, and they are chosen in even numbered years. The more people a state has living in it, the more representatives it has in Congress. And in the 113th Congress the House is controlled by Republicans who hold 234 seats, Democrats have 201 seats. Things are different in the Senate. There are 100 Senators there, two for each state, and they serve six years terms, so only about a third of their seats were up for election in November. Democrats have controlled the Senate with 53 seats, Republicans have 45 seats, and two seats are Independent, thought the Independents usually vote with the Democrats. Some of the top priority of the new Congress, a longer term solution of the fiscal cliff as we talked about, getting federal money to victims of Hurricane Sandy. And generally, figuring out what the government spends money on. With Democrats in control of the Senate and the presidency and Republicans in control of the House, you can see it’s going to take compromise to get legislation passed.