it was former senator alan simpson. he actually said that. >> really?snoopy poop dog? >> he's known for saying unusual things. he's retired, by the way. >> he's gangsta. >> no, no, okay. who said this? charlie sheen or moammar gadhafi said i will deploy my ordinance to the ground. >> oh, that's moammar gadhafi. >> charlie sheen. charlie sheen. we'll give you a chance to catch up tomorrow. good to see you. >> nice to see you, jessica. i'll see you in a few minutes. we'll be watching. >>> all right. still ahead, one of hollywood's most eligible bachelors is no longer single. we'll have the details. >>> plus an unwanted guest who just wouldn't leave. how this deer crashed a family's christmas party next. i'm forty-nine years-old, i love gardening, and i love volleyball. i've been taking osteo bi-flex for several years now. i really can't see myself not taking it. osteo bi-flex is a great product. i can go back and do gardening with comfort. [ male announcer ] osteo bi-flex, the glucosamine chondroitin supplement with 5-loxin advanced. shows improvement in

coming up in our next hour, congressman charlie rangel of new york and former wyoming senator alan simpson will discuss the battle which we've been talking about over the payroll tax cut. >>> i always like to quote chuck. our hump day political panel will be here next. we'll have more on the payroll tax fight. plus we've got a new poll that shows ron paul, yes, that's dr. ron paul, in the lead in iowa. but first, the white house soup of the day. cream of broccoli. i had a little broccoli cheddar at panera yesterday. i'm not going to lie. it was delicious. you're watching "the daily rundown" only on msnbc. in america, we believe in a future that is better than today. since 1894, ameriprise financial has been working hard for their clients' futures. never taking a bailout. helping generations achieve dreams. buy homes. put their kids through college. retire how they want to. ameriprise. the strength of america's largest financial planning company. the heart of 10,000 advisors working with you, one-to-one. together, for your future. ♪ >>> with congress at a standoff over the payroll tax, emot

. >> alan simpson, a former senator with wyoming has had a public feud with grover norquist. he has criticized people who have signed and continue to sign and abide by the grover norquist tax pledge. who is right in that debate? do you need tax revenue? are you a signatory of the grover norquist pledge? >> i have not signed the pledge. i have never signed the pledge. i really do not like tax raises. we need more tax revenue. we can get it by putting more people back to work. we had a chance to meet with bernanke from the fed this week. he said we are better to broaden the base than to raise the rates. i agree. that is the way to fiscal stability. there are lots of things we can do that are not raising taxes on anybody at this time. i got a note from senator samson yesterday. we talk frequency -- frequently. i know him well. anothernother i -want-- wyoming treasure. >> don't republicans have to get all low, whether it is some kind of revenue closing loopholes? otherwise, democrats are not going to reform medicare. >> number 1 is to close the loophole. you do not want anyone ta

now the guy who started this all a year ago, former debt commission co-chair, alan simpson, what do you make of this unusual anniversary day? >>guest: are you trying to blame this on me? >>neil: no, no, i will spread it around. >>guest: well, it is like d-day, or maybe, december 7th, but it is interesting to hear and i they are the senator and i understand his passion for this, but it is interesting to me to see the many calls that have come in. it has been a year. are you disappointed? i am not disappointed but disbelieving, i cannot belief -- i can believe the party would let this float as if social security would remain insolvency for 75 years, and medicare really could be paid for. it can't be paid for. it cannot, it is open automatic pilot. and it sucks you will all the stuff the other people agree whether it is john mccain on defense or people on discretionary, it will be sucked up by medicare which is on automatic pilot. >>neil: two who are fighting automatic sequestration, john mccain on defense and some democrats on medicare, if they find a way around the backup plan that was s

former republican senator alan simpson, former republican senator john talent, john sununu coming out as not just for the other guy but explicitly against newt gingrich. as has current republican senator tom coburn who says newt gingrich is one of the last people he would ever vote for for president. it doesn't stop with the republican establishment. the far right shock jock radio host michael savage is offering newt gingrich $1 million if he'll drop out of the race. glenn beck has said if newt gingrich is the nominee he might vote for ron paul as a third party candidate. whether or not ron paul's running as a third party candidate, i guess. this all comes amid mixed signals, frankly, about the sustainability of newtmetum in the polls. new data showing ron paul virtually tied with newt gingrich for the lead in iowa. here's a worrisome figure for republicans in today's nbc/"wall street journal" poll when asked if they would vote for enthusiasm, newt gingrich gets 14% of voters, mitt romney down at 12%. president obama still way ahead of both of them at 25%. so people aren't exactly exc

i'm to bring in senator alan simpson on the phone right now. he's a co-chair of president obama's national commission on fiscal responsibility and reform. senator, just a year ago you and erskine bowles presented your plan. what do you think could have been done more here? >> first let me say hello to charlie rangel. he worked together on a lot of stuff. that's the way it used to be. >> he's a straight shooting senator. >> i'm sitting out here in the wild of codey, wisconsin, on a beautiful winter day just shaking my old bald dome. this cannot be the way to run the nation's business. and then just have press conference after press conference whether it's the president or the democrats or the republicans, this is bs and mush. the people are sick and tired of it. here's one for you. wait until they do the payroll tax cut and that's fine. they've done that or maybe take it to 3.1. wait until you try to put it back on so you can sustain the solvency of the social security system and that will be called a tax increase. hang on to your shorts. this b

former republican senator alan simpson came out today and said he's against newt gingrich because as speaker mr. gingrich lied to president george h.w. bush's face back in 1990. and quote, i am ready to tell that story around the united states, says mr. simpson. that was all just today. in republicans versus newt gingrich and adds to a laundry list of newt gingrich in the recent days. charles krauthammer writing, quote, gingrich is possessed of an unbounded need of grand display that's led him to unconservative places even he is at a loss to explain. he's untamed by self-discipline. karl rove writing in "the wall street journal" yesterday, quote, when a man of his self-confidence begins to feel on top of the world, bad things often happen. oh, but wait, there's more. >> gingrich is an amazingly efficient candidacy and embodies almost everything disagreeable about modern washington. he's the classic rental politician. he denounces the ryan budget as right wing social engineering. he sits down to talk about climate change and cap and trade with nancy pelosi and others. the list goes on

alan simpson said, telling "time" magazine, he was the co-chair, that bill clinton would have actually embraced it. this presidentid not. governor christie of new jersey said this week, the following about president obama. >> it's a sad day in our country's history to have a bystander in the oval office. that's what we have. >> the president says, we cannot wait. we cannot wait. he did when it came to simpson-bowles. >> let m say one thing about what governor christie said about being a bystander. i watched this president make some very difficult decisions, difficult political decisions at the beginning of this administration to right the financial sector, to get this economy out of the freefall that it was in, to save the american auto industry. the candidate he's endorsed, governor romney work have let detroit go bankrupt, we would have lost a million more jobs. i don't think he's in a position to talk about who was a bystander. >> what about the debt? this is a huge issue. >> first of all, let's recognize the president appnted simpson and bowles and that commission, a lot of the ide

professional lifetime that includes starting working as either an intern or a lowly assistant to alan simpsonn the immigration issue, but moving forward, of course, to being a member of a house known for his bipartisan efforts, to be in both budget director and trade representative before moving to the senate. he understands as well as anybody that given the shakiness in europe, the troubles in the global economy, that we are no longer just playing with fire or even playing with live ammunition. we may be playing with atomic weapons in terms of the future. so there be an urgency to act and a recognition that as much as the super committee leaves many of us who believe in the regular order of the legislative process uneasy -- these extra and unusual actions are not really the way you would ideally like to go, but having the ability to take whatever you produce, brought forward for an up or down expedited vote with no filibusters, no delay tactics, and no amendments, was an unparalleled opportunity to get somewhere. i would offer a couple of reasons why. one, which rob alluded to right at the e

this is the kind of picture that the deficit commission that erskine bowles and alan simpson chaired. i was hoping that we would repaint this picture a number of times between the time they did that a year ago and now, because we have got to get america to understand -- and actually, i can tell you the people in my state really understand this. i don't need to explain it to them. they know how much more we're spending than what we're taking in. they can even remember the numbers, and they are concerned and they need to be concerned and we all need to be concerned. so i'm open to your suggestions. i will have some speeches later, again reiterating this definite problem that we're in. i have said a number of times that our country has maxed out its credit cards. a couple of weeks ago on my trip to wyoming, i checked into a hotel and i used my senate credit card, and the lady a few moments later very embarrassed said i'm sorry, but your card is being rejected. i said i guess the federal government is in worse trouble than i thought. i used my own card and it went through. so we better be

governor andrew cuomo and erskine bowles and alan simpson on the deficit commission.writer, a new play out focusing on the fight, the legal battles for marriage equality in california. awe smt, great, great play. the social conscience of our country. bowles-simpson is important. not household names, these two, clinton's former chief of staff, simpson, republican conservative senator, put together a game plan to bring back our economy. both parties encouraged to listen to them. >> something president clinton, of course, supports wholeheartedly. john, you agree on cuomo. and three in governor chris christie. listen, he always gets a lot of attention. you surprisingly have members of congress. six of them. the gang of six. and one presidential candidate, jon huntsman, who some people feel has not seen his time in the spotlight yet. let's talk about christie. >> christie and cuomo, the two best governors in america across from the hudson river together. at time when people are frustrated about what seems to be a failure in governance out of washington, these two guys have

bowles was the former chief of staff to our former president bill clinton, and our former colleague alan simpson. put together a package that whether or not you agreed with it, all of it, certainly you could not disagree that this was something that didn't put us on the path that we needed to go, yet that was rejected out of hand by the -- by the white house and others. we have seen the activities and presentations of the gang of six. 40-plus senators, including me, joined together in a bipartisan way to urge the president to join us in coming forward with a bold, comprehensive plan. that was rejected. the president's budget was laughed out of this chamber. not one person, either democrat or republican, voted for it. we came far short in august of what we needed to do. i wasn't able to support that particular plan. i did avert a debt limit increase crisis. nevertheless, that opportunity which we had with a, involvement of both parties to do something truly significant, that was passed over. and so it then fell to, it fell to the committee of 12, which is called the super committee. and many of

erskine bowles and senator alan simpson, they told us we're on the most predictable path to a financial crisis the nation has ever been on. and what they were saying was the unsustainable debt, as they called it, trajectory of this country will lead us to some sort of economic catastrophe, knock us back into a recession, put us back like 2007, 2008 or like what europe is facing right now. they pleaded with us to do something about it. and they, the debt commission, laid out a plan. i don't agree with everything in the plan. but it said at a minimum, a bipartisan agreement was achieved on this, the debt should be reduced. the added debt that we will incur over the next ten years should be reduced by at least $4 trillion. that we should reduce the growth of our debt by at least $4 trillion. so in the last two meetings in the budget control act, it looks like we achieved about $2.1 trillion, not the $4 trillion, but they all said we needed more than that. and because the increase in our debt over the next ten years would be about $10 trillion, $8 trillion. that's the increase on top of the

simpson. uria sinoa scabo. >> richard paul many --minetti cynthia smith. in grade anita smith. james alan smith. mary edna smith. john somerville. lindsay somers delfts -- lindsay somerville. roslyn haiti somerville. james ralph scope. geraldine stevenson. connell louise stevenson. john charles stevenson. rachel stevenson. charlotte stinnis. michael barry stinnis. stacey stennis. dahlia stratich. >> roger carson -- anthony swan. flora macdonald margaret dwyer. mark alex paget. andrew alexander john. david william trevor. arvo anthony thomas. jonathan ryan, as. rwanda, mark lawrence cohen. alexia kathryn. barry joseph valentino. thomas hinholden than. thomas this sunni. nicholas renia. peter loco. >> les rogers. raymond wagner. janine wyedu. thomas edwin walker. kisha weeden. jerome weston. jonathan wind. bonnie lee williams. britney lead williams. eric john williams. george williams. stephanie williams. miriam levee wolf. chelsea marie woods. edra woods. joe nathan would. joe nathan woods jr.. mark james zenberg. we remember. [silence] [silence] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [silence] >> we are going

erskine bowles and alan simpson of president obama's debt commission said we are facing the most predictable financial crisis in our nation's history as a result of our debt. we need to get kearse about how to fix it. i thank the chair and would yield the floor. mr. cardin: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: i ask unanimous consent to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. cardin: mr. president, today i rise to address a humanities issue of deep -- a human rights issue of deep concern. for two years since december 3, 2009, an american citizen and a marylander, alan gross, has been imprisoned by the cuban government. two years he has been held by the cuban authorities. alan was in cuba to help the country's small jewish community establish an internet and improve its access to internet access which would allow the community to go online without fear of censorship or monitoring. after being held for 14 months without charge and then a cursory two-day trial, he was convicted and sentenced to 15 years in prison. hi