really going on we're going to talk to bob english contributing editor of zero hedge and economic policy journal dot com it is his inaugural debut on capital account so first welcome to the show and thanks so much for being on. thanks it's great to be here lord yes so bob let's get started because today we had the f o m c's rate decision no surprise there is zero percent and till late two thousand and fourteen they think as we've heard before ben bernanke had a press conference pretty much i would say a lot of the questions were geared towards is q e three coming what would be the situation in order to substantiate q e three coming or other unconventional easing measures and that was really what people trying to get out so my question to you is there anything interesting any interesting my new show that you can pick out of the f.o. emcees announcement today. well ben bernanke is always talking about his tools and he's never afraid to use a thinly veiled threat that at some future time given a stock market decline of maybe ten percent or followed in europe that he will point his bazooka back up a

economic policy, policy center, laura peterson, senior policy analyst, taxpayera pollack, senior policy analyst, the economic policy institute. our moderator for this morning's panel is jim tankersley, the economics correspondent for national journal. jim joined us from the tribune washington bureau where he covered energy, the environment and politics for newspapers, including the "los angeles times" and the "chicago tribune." he previously worked at "the toledo blade" and "the rocky mountain news" and "the oregonian." mr. tankersley and a colleague at the blade won the 2007 livingston award for their business as usual series of stories revealing the true roots of ohio's economic decline. he was part of the coingate people that was a finalist for the pulitzer prize. jim? >> thank you so much. thank you all for sticking around. i'm a numbers nerd myself, and have been delighted with the amount of numbers so far this morning. but i want to start without numbers and start with some raw politics. we just heard a lot of theoretical discussion back and forth about how numbers and how we should do this for $5 trillion here, $4 trillion there. let's talk about what is going to happen, right. what does this look like a year from now, both

economic policy institute. our moderator for this morning's panel is jim tankersly, the economics correspondent for "national journal." jim joined us from the tribune washington bureau covering energy, environment and politics for newspapers including the "los angeles times" and the "chicago tribune," previously worked at the "to lead ledo bla" he won the 2007 livingston award for young journeyists of stories revealing the true roots of ohio's economic decline and part of the coingate team at the toledo blade, a finalist for the pulitzer prize. jim? >> thank you so much. thank you all for sticking around. i'm a numbers nerd myself, and i've been delighted with the amount of numbers so far. but i want to start without numbers and start with raw numbers. how numbers and how we should do this, 5 trillion here, 4 trillion there. let's talk about what's going to happen. right? what's -- what does this look like a year from now? both from the lame duck and going forward. how much closer do you all think we will be towards actual, you know, fiscal health, towards balancing our budget and most importantly, where will those

up something that's in the "wall street journal" this morning "the worst economic recovery in history" it's from an economiest named ed laz lazear, saying policies cash for clunkers and first time home buyer credits rather than on creating conditions that are favorable to the investment that raise productivity." this is something i've heard more poignantly, the regulatory horizon is not clear, the tax horizon is not clear, that the president hasn't been able to make it a confident kind of environment for companies, that's why they're sitting on trillions of dollars in cash and not hiring people. so you have these two different world views about the recovery and who is responsible for it, and how strong it is, and what people with the middle class believes will probably decide the election in november. and it's all kind of coming into focus right now. >> we've heard the administration tout the recovery, so now if this is going to be the retort from the republicans, how will the democrats come back as we move into the clear cycle over the summer to say this is why it's at this pace. >> it's interesting because the white house is focusing on this w

policies and how they affect whether or not we have economic security in this country. jon: he is certainly on fire there. steve moore is senior economics writer for the "wall street journale's been listening to the president's remarks. there was an awful lot there. he said essentially this election is going to offer a very stark choice between two economic philosophies. would i have to agree with him there, would you steve. >> reporter: i would too, jon. it's exactly echoing when paul ryan said last week when he issued his budget. remember, jon, he said this is a contrast of visions, and president obama agrees with that. you know, in this speech a little later on i got some of the excerpts from it he calls the paul ryan budget and exercise in social darwinism. it's very overheated rhetoric. i do think that this is going to be the framework for what we're debating over the next four or five months, whether americans want the kind of higher taxes, bigger government, obama healthcare plan, or do they want, deficit reduction, do they want a tax reform, and do they want spending cuts, and that really is where the division is right now. jon: that is the paul ryan budget that p