john harwood, is it a good sign or bad sign the longer this goes on? john harwood, are you with us?n harwood is at the white house, but i do not think he can hear us -- >> reporter: yes, john harwood. welcome back to "closing bell." we're still waiting at the white house for insurance executives to come out of the meeting. we don't know exactly what they're going to say and what sort of business was transacted, but we don from what president obama said at the outset, that they're trying to work together to figure out not just the fixes for people who had existing policies, but also for how to make people understand their options on these exchange websites, which don't know work. here's the president. >> because of choice in competition, a whole lot of americans who have always seen health insurance out of risk -- or out of reach are going to be in a position to purchase it. and because of the law, we'll also be able to provide them help even if they are still having trouble purchasing that insurance, but they have to know what those options are in order to be successful. >> reporter

. >> john harwood joins us now from washington with more on this. you know, john, a lot of people wondering and questioning today, can president obama make these rule changes? i mean, after all the affordable care act is the law. does congress at some point have to vote on this? i mean, talk us through how the process will work. >> well, first of all, susie, i think the thing to remember about this is this is mostly about the president trying to provide political cover for democrats and for himself to buy time until the exchanges are going to work. the website will be fixed. he's not compelling any changes, and he's not giving a huge new grant of authority to states. what he's doing is saying that if state insurance commissioners and insurance companies want to extend policies further, they can, but the reality is that most of them don't want to because they want to move into the new world of insurance under the affordable care act. it is not clear how much this will change. it may extend some policies and at the very latest unless there's an additio

for more on the budget talks, let's join john harwood. we've seen this movie before and the market was very volatile during that period of time. are we in for another round? >> well, sue, we have seen this movie, not only before but continuously for two years, ever since 2011 when the setup of the super committee trying to get a deal for additional deficit reduction but couldn't get it because of this very simple equation. republicans said to get a deal we need to cut entitlements, democrats said we need to raise taxes. republicans have not been willing to go there. the question is is there some sort of a deal that can evade that fundamental road block? the way to do it is shrink the deal small to make the entitlements not about social security and medicare, the hut buttons but subsidies where you can get bipartisan agreement and make the revenue increases very small, not general tax increases but some sort of user fees on specific sets of consumers of government services and that's where we are right now, and we've got to see if we can g

john harwood reporting. >>>or several years chance fats are disappearing from grocery isles and restaurant menus. now the food and drug administration will finish the job. the fda announced it will require the food industry to gradually phase out art fish l chance fats. they can raise levels of bad cholesterol increasing the risk of heart disease, the heart clogging substance was once common in the american diet showing up in baked goods, fried foods, microwave popcorn. >>> a dow component thousand dollar stock. could they set the tone for tomorrow? but first, a look at how international markets closed the day. >>> a pair of big name earnings out after the bell. price line and disney, price line earned $17.39 a share beating stimates. revenue rose $2.27 billion, also beating estimates. shares are up after hours and arup, hold on to your hat, 1200% since the market lows of 2009. sheila joins us from the nasdaq. sheila, what is the big take away on price line's numbers? >> the big take away the e travel sector

i think you might have heard john harwood's report. i want to ask you, regarding the fred upton vote in the house, some conservatives are saying vote against it because it helps to prolong obama care. what's your take on that in what are you hearing? >> you do see a discussion that obama care stumbles have been so great so far, you might as well stand back and let the implementation continue to have its problems. i think the majority of the house republicans are coming around the idea to support the upton bill tomorrow to let people take a stand on keeping their plans. >> and do you think that obama's speech today is going to influence democrats in the house or the senate? >> i think democrats, especially those up for re-election in 2014, remain uneasy. the president's press conference today wasn't exactly a tour de force. it was more of an explanation. he was trying to get democrats back on his side but i think the problems persist. >> and do you think there will be a vote in the senate? >> i think harry reid knows that he needs to th

first, to john harwood at the white house. boy, john, wouldn't you like to be a fly on the wall for this meeting, huh? >> reporter: well, i would, bill, because the insurance industry didn't like what the administration did yesterday. at least some portions of it. at least on the other hand, they don't want to be in a pitch battle for very long with the administration. how they're going to approach this meeting, what they're going to request from the white house, what the white house is going to give them, is all going to be fascinating to learn. although i don't think we'll learn it today because the insurance executives pointedly declined to talk walking into the meeting. they avoided reporters. they have indicated that they don't plan to talk when they come out of the meeting. we'll see if the substance of the exchanges makes any difference in that. but what the administration did yesterday, the executives complained, puts the blame on them for the cancellations of a lot of thooe these policies. the white house said it was o

no surprise there hearing from john harwood. john says we got through some of the worries of the debt ceiling and budget impasse the last time around but a second go-round with budget concerns and debt issue may not play out as well. next it's the fund managers take. the folks that make the investing decisions about where to put the money. kneale hensy says his biggest worry the unemployment situation is not being resolved fast enough and blames uncertainty on taxes, regulation, and yes, even health care. once that gets resolved hiring will start to pick up. that's what kneale thinks. our traders' take from john at meridian equity partners on the floor of the nyse. he says a possible market taper tantrum is his worry. john says the fed will have to pull back on stimulus at some point but his fear any panic may have ripple effects possibly without any cause and janet yellen of course the nominee, presumptive new fed chair, hasn't been confirmed, but maybe that's a concern with the fed and the common theme here, tyler, all washingt

first, to john harwood at the white house. u like to be a fly on the wall for this meeting, huh? >> reporter: well, i would, bill, because the insurance industry didn't like what the administration did yesterday. at least some portions o.

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john harwood, thank you very much.october jobs report a big win for the obama administration and joining us as they do often on these jobs days, mark, ceo of the national urban league, former mayor of new orleans, watching closely the president speaking in new orleans, and ron is here, ceo of christie strategies and former special assistant to president george w. bush. welcome back. good to have you with us. how good were the numbers, ron, from where you sit? >> not very good. if you look at 204,000, better than what the market anticipated but when you peel back the onion half of those jobs are minimum wage jobs. you're talking about 100,000, you know, net new jobs created that aren't at the minimum wage level. this is not a step in the right direction for trying to increase the economic well being for those in the middle class. >> labor force participation, apparently come way down as people pulled out, i guess. >> the markets have responded favorably and that's what's important. to your question as to the president i

. >> weighing in on all this, cnbc's john harwood joins us from washington, d.c. john, good evening. okay, so i want to ask you, did he make an apology? that's my first question. and my second question related to the first question, what exactly was he telling us? i saw that piece so many times last night. what's he trying to say? >> it's a good question, larry. it was a sort of apology. but it was an apology that was not really responsive to the issue at hand. he said he was sorry that people were in a position because of assurances from him. but really no consumer did anything because of obama's assurances, maybe some legislators did when they voted for the law. but what has caused people to have their plans canceled is the fundamental purpose of the law itself, the law aimed on purpose to shake up the individual market by raising standards and pulling in people who may have had plans that were inexpensive maybe because they were younger and affluent and healthy because they need those people in the exchanges in order to make it work for other people to get benef

. >> well, john harwood joins us once again from washington tonight. we would love to know what was said in the meeting after the president spoke. , what happens next at this point? >> well, the most important thing that happens next is the effort between now and november 30th of the administration to meet it's pledge to get that website functioning smoothly. they reported progress so far and it was interesting that in the outside of the meeting, including the bite you played, bill, the president may clear his agenda, wasn't just about the fix which may be a dubious impact in the long run. we don't know how many people will be effected by that but enlisting executives to help work around where necessary, the problems with the website, communicate with customers get people signed up because what will determine the success or failure of the law is whether they can get a critical mass of people to sign up under kpt changes, under the new pricing structure that left the old one behind, which is why you won't see that many policies extended into 2015. if th

cnbc's john harwood joins us now. john, give us the insiders take on what went down at the white house. >> reporter: we're still trying to figure it out. this was a long meeting. it went for two hours. you can tell they were down to some nitty gritty business because neither the white house nor the insurance executives had been willing to talk so far after that meeting. but it was interesting that the president, when he greeted the executives at the outset of the meeting and let photographers in for a few moments indicated the meeting was not only about that fix he outlined but about the broader task of enlisting insurance executives to help the white house surmount the problems of the obama care website which are preventing so many people from learning what their options are and buying insurance. here's the president. >> because of choice of competition, a whole lot of americans who always seen health insurance out of reach are going to be in a position to purchase it. and because of the law we're also going to be abl

we have to go to john harwood in washington where a key vote is about to take place. >> the house ofntatives is about to vote on a republican proposal that would go after a principal feature of the affordable care act by forcing or scratch that not by forcing by allowing insurers to sell policies that don't comply with the affordable care act not only to new customers but old customers. the white house views this as a hostile act against the bill. democrats view it that way. that's why it's not likely to pass the congress but likely to pass the house and one othe interesting things to watch is going how many democrats vote for this bill. remember, the president's fix announced yesterday was designed to give political cover to democrats to oppose this bill. we're going wait and see over the next 15 minutes how many of them vote with this bill and this is going to be an interesting result although not likely to pass the senate. >> john, a quick question. there's been some emails that have been uncovered out there saying that there was some criticism of the website earlier, that people

i like the new york times and john harwood, but i don't agree. i think they overwrote it.nything. you don't get dollar for dollar what you put in in taxes. this does it also. the rich had to pay more so the medicaid expansion could happen. >> goes well beyond that though. >> no. >> it does. they mention in passing that the rich are paying 2% income tax. talk about premiums, people losing plans, having to pay more so they can fund the plans the newly insured are getting. none of it was disclosed by the president. >> that wasn't the purpose of them paying more. they are paying more to get better insurance. >> they don't want or need. the reason they needed to make them do it is they needed the money. >> they needed them in the exchanges but they needed everyone to have better insurance f. you have catastrophic care coverage and not coverage for normal things you are in the emergency room and everyone pays for it. >> i don't know what kind of world we are in when the new york times and david axelrod quoted as talking about the fact that in this country we have a sense that ev

john harwood joining us now. john, i'm trying to understand the president's sort of intention in giving this sort of rare media appearance at all. what was the intention of bringing the president out? >> reporter: you know, i think the president, who has been dogged by very damaging stories about obama care, look forward to celebrating a victory for his party and a victory for his administration in terms of enhancing their ability to fill out the court vacancies, fill out administration vacancies, making the case that was the flipside of the one republicans are making in the senate. republicans are saying hey, democrats, be careful because the shoe's going to be on the other foot. when we're in the majority, you're vulnerable to what you're doing to us right now. and the president was making the opposite case for president, saying it's not just about my ability to stock my government, it's about a future president's ability. and, of course, any future president could easily be a republican. but i think overall, th

john harwood joins us now for a little commentary on this. what do you make of this? >> reporter: we can't help ourselves. it's three years early. we just came out of a presidential election. because hillary clinton is so dominant over the democratic field in this poll we saw two-thirds of democrats say they intended to support as of this moment, and chris christie has just come out of this very, very large landslide win for re-election in new jersey, the temptation is pretty irresistible. christie we see from this survey is not in as strong a position as hillary clinton. he gets about a third of the vote from republicans but the bulk of that comes from the northeastern states where he's from. he'll have to do well in many other parts of the country. but it's fun to watch and i suspect, i don't know how you feel about it, larry, if jeb bush doesn't run, i think he would be the strongest republican but if he doesn't as we sit today i think chris christie is in the best position. >> i had dinner with a former chief of staff to jeb bush. very interesting for you to say t

i'm john harwood in washington. the united states senate, democrats in the united states senate, have just now invoked what is known as the nuclear option on judicial nominees. that is to say by a majority vote, they got 52 votes in the senate, they changed the rules so that for the first time nominees for federal courts short of the supreme court, it doesn't affect the supreme court, no longer have to get 60 votes to end debate. now they can do it with a majority vote. this came, because democrats were frustrated by republican opposition to some of president obama's judicial nominees, just as republicans had been frustrated by democratic opposition to some of president bush's nominees. but a lot of people have talked about pulling this so-called nuclear trigger for the nuclear option. it happened when bill frist was the republican leader, and now harry reid has actually done it. republicans are warning it's going to change and degrade the quality of debate in the united states senate. we will see what happens as we

john harwood of cnbc and "the new york times." indira lakshmanan of "bloomberg news" and jeff zeleny of abc news. >> reporting and analysis, covering history as it happens. live from our nation's capital, this is "washington week with gwen ifill." corporate funding for "washington week" is provided by -- >> we went out and asked people a simple question -- how old is the oldest person you've known? we gave people a sticker and had them show us. a lot of us have known someone who's lived well into their 90's and that's a great thing. but one thing that hasn't changed, the official retirement age. the question is how do you make sure you have the money you need to enjoy all of these years? >> additional corporate funding for "washington week" is provided by northrop grumman. additional funding is provided by the annenberg foundation, the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to pbs stations from viewers like you. thank you. once again, live from washington, moderator gwen ifill. gwen: good evening. this week's hea

. >> john harwood is cnbc chief washington correspondent. at 8:00 a.m. eastern time the website is scheduled to be back online. how do we know it's working as it's supposed to as the president said? >> we won't and nobody really will be able to take a global assessment. the administrations will see what it sees.ry will see from its perspective. but we're left with a little bit of guesswork. it's murky deadlines. the president said in that clip you just played, erica, it will work much better or other administration officials say for the vast majority of people, they will have a much better experience. that is designed to be ambiguous enough to withstand whatever anecdotes come up from people who said, hey, i tried to logon and enroll in insurance and i couldn't get through. the ultimate test is at the end of the month when people are trying to sign up for coverage that is -- takes effect on january 1st. that is one critical first deadline. then the enrollment period through the end of next march. if the administration can hit targets to make those exchan

john harwood with more. john? >> reporter: this is a huge mess.g to do what it can to minimize the damage of that. that's the fix that the president announced today isn't likely to have a huge effect on the insurance market because most states and insurance companies want to move on to the new standard they've set, but the administration felt the need to deflect some of the heat that was coming on to themselves and to congressional democrats who vote today on a plan by republicans that would purport to fix the law but democrats believe it would gut the law by allowing new customers to come on to the individual market. the president will meet with those insurance executives this afternoon. he'll be taking some fire from them. they were criticizing his plan, the one industry source telling me yesterday this plan is a joke that just deflects blame on to the insurance companies. i would expect the administration to try to tell the insurance companies that they will give them a little bit of a break on what they call the risk provisions of the obama ca

we'll hear from the president on the affordable care act and what we might expect, we'll turn to john harwooder: we'll hear from the president 11:45. i've been talking to insurance industry sources who have been watching over the next several days, and the verdict is very harsh so far. just got a message from one who said that the plan that obama is going to announce at 11:45, in the words of this source, is a joke. it doesn't change anything but allows the white house to blame insurance companies. now, the source's understanding of what the president is going to say, is they're going to ask states and insurance companies to extend cancelled policies. but, of course, states and insurance companies already have the discretion to do that in the transition to the new law. in fact, some have been doing that. some of the people getting these cancellation letters have been able to extend their plans. so it is not clear whether or not what the president's going to announce at 11:45 is going to compel any different action than what's already taking place, or is simply a public relations approach to t

john harwood in washington. wanted to to take a look at the deal on what it means for oil. nymex, we're still down. >> reporter: but not by nearly as much as we were earlier when the market opened last night. and as john harwood laid out clearly, there is a lot still left to be worked out to see when this deal will come to fruition and traders realizing that, and that's why perhaps we're looking at brent crude prices $2 higher than lows in the overnight session. we are watching to see what will happen in terms of the fallout, what it means for the crude oil market. as we have the sanctions that are in place right now, that has reduced iran's exports from 2 1/2 million barrels per day to 1 million mper day. 1 million per day is a de facto increase in levels we've seen since october. october, iran was pumping out 715,000 barrels per day. we still have a little ways to go to get to the 1 million mark. that could put more oil on the market quickly, which could pressure prices. that is why we could see oil prices, brent crude prices at $90 barrel mark by the end of the year. oth

we're joined by john harwood and julian epstein, former legal counsel, now democratic strategist. 're hearing there could be something later in the week from the administration. pp what do you know? >> the house is headed to a vote on a bill the republicans have pushed forward that would extend some health plans that the administration regards as directly hostile to the goals of the affordable care act. we haven't seen anything from the administration since the president made those remarks or since bill clinton made his remarks. one of the reasons is, it's very hard to do anything that doesn't go directly after and do violence to the act itself because the affordable care act intended to shake up the individual marketplace in ways that caused the people getting those cans clacellation notices to get new plans and pay higher premiums, in some cases for better plans or the same plan. the reason is they need that money to finance benefits for other people. so, whatever fix they come up with, the larger it is, the more of a problem it is for the goals that the president set under the l

our john harwood has details. >> reporter: there are a lot of things the president of the united statestrol right now as he waits for a fix on his health care website. but one thing he can control is his own nominations. he is nominating tim massad, replacing the regulator. tim has worked at the treasury department, overseen the t.a.r.p. program, the white house mentioned that in the announcement. wouldn't expect any confirmation difficulties with tim massad. >> thank you so much. wearing the hat of ceo means big responsibility. quite often, big money as well. a new study is concluding chief executives living opulent lifestyles are increasing chances others at their company will commit fraud. i can't connect the dots on this one. >> it's an eye-opening report. this is an academic study. goes on page after page by page. done by three researchers aren't the country. they found for every year ceo that likes to live big lifestyles, fraud raises by 6%. j.p., we have our own robert frank, who wines and dines with the rich and famous for us as well. j.p., do you buy this connection these resea

john harwood is going to update us on the vote. >>> and one analyst slapping twitter with a sell. he will join us after the break to say what's behind the bearish call on the stock. that and more just ahead. [ male announcer ] once, there was a man who found a magic seashell. it told him what was happening on the trading floor in real time. ♪ the shell brought him great fame. ♪ but then, one day, he noticed that everybody could have a magic seashell. [ indistinct talking ] [ male announcer ] right there in their trading platform. ♪ [ indistinct talking continues ] [ male announcer ] so the magic shell went back to being a...shell. get live squawks right in your trading platform with think or swim from td ameritrade. >>> welcome back to "the half." big moves on the trading floor today. let's check in on the action at the cmi for a triple play. first up, chris at the cme. what's going on there? >> right now, not much. you know, if it wasn't happy hour in about four hours, i think a lot of the guy wuss have their pillows out. everybody is drained from the last night, overnight trade.

john harwood has details for us. >> bill, actually in this case, a fight might represent some progressfar, ever since the deal to reopen the government, not much of anything has happened between the two parties who are supposed to be negotiating this deal. now, negotiators have lowered their sights significantly. it's either a small deal of around $150 million or a really small deal of around $50 billion. there's been no formal exchange of offers yet. there's only a month to go before the deadline that was set when they reopened the government. democrats are hoping to get some sort of framework by thanksgiving but that looks like a longshot. the key sticking point is, is there going to be revenue? republicans held out one idea for a user fee, on airline passengers increasing the amount that people pay for legs of a journey. democrats have put out the possibility of a whole range of breaks targeting wealthy people. deductions for vacation homes, for yachts, corporate loopholes, all sorts of things, things wealthy people do with i.r.a.s to shield their income. both sides have to address

john harwood has details. >> reporter: they are extremely dissatisfied.re two parts of what the president sadid today. one is this fix. he told states and insurance companies that they have the latitude under obama care to extend policies that don't comply with the affordable care act into 2015. as late as the end of september 2015. that's nine months longer than they currently can do that. but insurers have priced their products for 2014 based on the new structure, the new benefit structure. and they've also sent out those letters. so it's very difficult to accomplish. we've seen both the american association of health insurance plans and individual companies like etna saying we need more relief in order to make this happen. because of what the rate structure has implied for their business in 2014. now, the second part of what the president did was try to apologize even more fulsomely than he has before for the messed up rollout of the law. he turned -- he's a sports guy. he turned to a sports analogy for what went wrong. >> i think it's legitimate for t

>> actually, we're going to go to john harwood in washington because we're awaiting the statement fromn basically the senate's efforts to confirm presidential nominees. it has to do with the filibuster rules. the democratic-led senate changed the rules for the votes needed. john, this is pretty significant for the president. and tell us what you expect to hear from him when he comes out momentarily. >> reporter: well, i expect him to say that he now can look forward to the fact that the senate's going to act on more of his nominees including nominees for the d.c. appeals court which has vacancies. and he's made nominations that have been held up. significant not only for the president and his agenda but also significant for the senate. republicans say in a bad way that it's going to change the character of the senate, which has always been one that relied on consensus and deliberation. and democrats are making the argument, as republicans did, when democrats were blocked president bush's nominees, that they've taken it too far. the ability and the right to filibuster. so this is a part

joining us now from washington, john harwood.ons i follow twitter is because you're -- i follow you. and i got -- i get a lot of redskins news, i get a lot of duke news. i know you saw kentucky last night, which was kind of -- you know, it's early. you can't get too excited about college -- >> no, we lost to kansas last night. >> kansas is good, right? >> we're good, too. >> you are. okay. i know. take it easy. but one of the things that you saw yesterday -- and i don't understand a lot of where you're coming from, as you know, because we talk bp. but i saw you say yesterday that president clinton's comments about obama care should be filed in the meaningless slash irrelevant file. and i'm trying to figure out what you meant by that because everyone is covering it and no one else thought it was meaningless. and what were you saying, that president obama said the same thing? >> well, he did say the same thing and it was also kind of irrelevant, which is why we haven't seen this so-called mystery fix that was being talked about. th

john harwood has the details in washington for us. john? with the tremendous p.r. flood of negative p.r. about obama care. today, jason furman, chairman of the economic advisors, published a report which tried to take credit for some of the positive news in health care, which is about the cost and price of health care. if you look, according to the report, the jason furman briefed us on moments ago, over the last three years, total national spending per capita on health care has risen at only a rate of 1.3% beyond inflation. that is much more moderate than at any three-year period since we began measuring in 1965. there's big debate over the source of the slowdown in health costs. some people attribute it to cyclical effects of the economic slowdown in general. other people attribute it in part to the changes from the affordable care act, and that's what jason furman was pressing, year-to-year price inflation in health care, the cost of specific health care services, is now running just 1%. and that translates into lower costs. if it is sus

next, chairman cook of the cook political report, chuck todd of nbc news, and john harwood of cnbc and the "new york times" talk about the 2014 elections. this was hosted by the atlantic, aspen institute, and the newseum. >> charlie, when i met you 30 years ago, we were then talking about a republican lock on the presidency. we knew it was a center-right country. we knew that social issues worked for the republicans, and we wondered when a democratic candidate could carry california again. we then went to a period when the exemplified by bush-gore, an even 50/50 split. it appeared in this election, to me, as if we saw revealed that the place that shifted a little in democratics on the high side drip demography. are we headed towards a democratic lock on the white house? what do you see in terms of the balance going forward? >> that's a great question, john. >> what do you think happens first? democrats elect a president or republicans legislate a speaker this is about in 1990-91 #. someone said, you know, when one happens, the other will probably follow, which i just thought was really

in just a few minutes, we've got john harwood. he'll join us to go through the politics on this and some of the realities on how it can possibly work. in the meantime, let's send it over to andrew. >> we have a lot of corporate news this morning. kimberly clark announcing its board of directors authorizing its management team to pursue a potential tax free spin-off of the health care business which has $1.6 billion in sales. take a look at shares of the consumer products giant closing at an all-time high yesterday. we're going to talk to the company's ceo tom falk at 7:30 a.m. eastern time this morning. the play station 4 officially now on sale, a little over six hours ago that gamers were able to get their hands on sony's new game console. the price tag, $399. we're going to have a product review of what it is and what it means. it's 6:30 a.m. eastern time. and we're getting a peek into the portfolios of some of the world's biggest investors. warren buffett, snapping up stake in exxon. at yesterday's closing price of $93.22, that