joining us now is governor james florio. good morning, good to see you. >> thank you very much. >> the bottom line here is whether or not these assault bans work, whether, as a result of putting the assault bans in motion, whether it was the local assault ban or federal assault bans, do they actually reduce gun violence? is this any proof that that happens? >> well, the answer is that the communities involved will make the determination, but the public interest is not served with greater access to oozies and ak-47's. and when you have a person inclined to violence, knives over that uzis with a clip. and kickly with guns to assault weapons, these are things used in war, specifically designed to kill as many people as rapidly as possible. >> the assault weapons ban only lasted ten years, the president now in favor of renewing it, had the opportunity when he had both the house and the senate, he did not do that. the centers for disease control and prevention, i think you'll agree is a pretty neutral organization, came out with

. >> here with me now is james florio, former democratic governor of new jersey, now senior fellow foric policy and administration at rutgers university. thank you very much for being here with us today. >> thank you. >> were you one of the first -- you were the first governor in the country to pass an assault weapons ban. that was back in 1990. what do you upon hearing these claims from the nra after the latest school shooting? >> well, the nra just works from the assumption that a small cadre of people like them that are really true believers and committed can overwhelm the public interest. what we have to do sen gage the general public, get them involved and get them informed and that can prevail. the big problem is there's too many guns and he's arguing we should have more guns in the school and everything else. doesn't make a whole lot of sense. they also work with the assumption that when the public becomes engaged as it did in new jersey, when we put it past the strongest ban on assault weapons, that they then try to run out the clock, try to rope-a-dope people around so people

i'm joined by former democratic governor of new jersey, james florio. and heidi moore. finance and editor of "the guardian newspapers. and dean baker, author of "the end of loser liberalism, making markets progressive." codirector of the center for economic and policy research. so, after at least after a dozen different public offers, countless press conferences and weeks of closed car door talks lawmakers in washington left town for the holidays on friday without an agreement to avert what we're calling the fiscal curb. a series of automatic tax increases and spending cuts to take affect a week from now. a moment this week, the two sides seemed on the cusp of a deal. that would have involved at least one major concession from president obama. to cut social security benefits. the cuts wouldn't have been direct. they would have come from a tweak to the way the social security benefits are calculated. here's how it works. right now the amount of money a retireee gets from the government gets is changed due to the index. when inflakes goes up, social security recipients se