. >>> steve cole joins us for a must read opinion pages.t back. >> a live look at capitol hill. stop it. >> we are reading some of the dumber tweets of the morning. there is one great one. >> okay. >> this is from len da lee. she said i hopepy very republican mom is watching. morning, mika, in saint john wear. she would be very welcome at the country club. linda, it looks like saint john wear. >> okay. here with us now, the dean of columbia university school of journalism. i got my mug and staff writer of "the new yorker" steve cole, it was wonderful to speak at jay's school yesterday. thank you so much for having us. >> you lit them up. did you see them women in len to talk to mika? they encircled lou wis? i was like playing jacks. >> they were having both of us. really appreciate it. >> lewis? >> you were great. >> louis was a beg hit. you made a big impression on people. >> it is. quite a message. let's get to the must reads. i picked this one. this is actually a letter to the editor. tell me, if anyone at this table disagrees with this.

the idea, steve, of how much sway the tea party has at this point, i think the jury is still out. you have tom coleo has been a moderate basically all along but forced at specific moments during the shutdown and after the fact to go along with fractious strategy than he would have preferred. i wonder just where the republican party will find its center. >> let me put an uncomfortable truth out there. it's not just the tea party driving this process. fiscal conservatives in the democratic party and republican party that look at the fact that fiscal solvency really matters to them, whether that's the right policy to pursue is a different question. i think they are looking at the sequester as something that's achieving cuts. it's working away. it's eating away at what they see the largesse of government. what i find interesting is i can't find a leader in congress that says we shouldn't pass some way to make it flexible. we should be able to give the department of defense or office of management and budget flexibility how to apply across accounts. it's a sharp bludgeon that cuts across. no one says th