as soon as they did, if passed, max baucus and other democrats in the senate said, "now, we are not with you," and bill clinton dropped them like a bad habit. they dropped this already, but it will not be part othe senate, nopart of e publican platform 2012. plan, theng rling florida. mainew lee, mr. shirtless, stecntright now. agreen heods. la lg. rstas.eshate y setin w r ifim abt, ith cat revenuein it everyby, ten y add onor two. inls i commission -- bowles simpson commission, take way all th plsndheighest is >>oueay iminate all loopholes -- >> that is exactly it -- >> everybodyyby nefits. >> how do you feel about t home mortgage deduction, the charitable deduction you want to deprive hospitals and schools in central cities? there will be a case made -- fit. remember the fight traith exception and to pull -- real- estate -- exception and a loophole for real estate deals? democrats all over theoury were quaking and other birds. >> wou dag would be a good idea of all of these were elimined >> i think t86f e ea aiemts- >> we agree on that. ought to try to do it again. >>he exempted at the

as soon as they did, if passed, max baucus and other democrats in the senate said, "now, we are not with you," and bill clinton dropped them like a bad habit. they dropped this already, but it will not be part of the senate, not part of the republican platform in 2012. is this the only alternative, we will be stuck with the existing system. the ryan plan, the politics of it, are telling republicans in the northeast -- killing republicans in the northeast. you talked to republicans from new england -- >> florida. >> but particularly the northeast. there will be a change of the president shows leadership and a grabs the moment. i will tell you what is going to be a real problem in this matter, and that is the special house elections on the 24th of may in new york for the seat held by jack kemp, bill paxon, and chris lee, mr. shirtless, most recently. republican district for 45 years, and democrats are leading right now. if they win, they will lock in the position that you cannot touch as single gray hair -- >> what happens if they don't raise the debt ceiling? i heard austin goolsbee the o

finance committee chairman max baucus says a mechanism like that will be on the agenda for tomorrow's meeting with the vice president. >> whether there will be one, i don't know. what its composition will be, i don't know. there are a wide range of ideas on what it should be, but i suspect that's going to be very high on the list of subjects that we are going to talk about. >> reporter: the president is calling for limits on how fast the national debt can grow. if it tops his goal, automatic spending cuts and tax increases would kick in. those tax increases are a problem for republicans like utah's orrin hatch. >> if it's a trigger that amounts to automatic taxation, then i'm against that, because i don't think it is the revenue side that's the problem. i think the spending side is the problem, and we all know it. >> reporter: but if the budget mechanism is aimed solely at cutting spending, policy expert bob greenstein warns republicans will have no reason to reach a deal that addresses all the nation's budget problems. greenstein says that's one way a bad budget trigger will be worse

but max baucus, the chairman of the senate finance committee, says oil company financial statements tell a different story. companies' 2010 profits went to >> nearly 60% of these companies' 2010 profits went to stock buybacks and to dividends, not to job creation. we can put this money to better use, i believe, and we should. we should use this money to reduce our deficit instead of putting the burden on seniors and our children's futures. >> reporter: a better way to raise revenue, the executives said, would be to open more land in the u.s. to oil exploration. they argued that would add jobs and bring in revenue for the federal government. exxon c.e.o. rex tillerson added raising taxes will do nothing to counter the pain at the pump. >> increasing these companies' taxes would only discriminate against certain u.s. workers, make our companies less competitive against others who are in the same business, and discourage future energy investment. >> reporter: democrats know their bill doesn't have enough votes to overcome republican opposition to raising taxes on oil companies, but analysts

disastrous results especially for progressives in two thousand and nine a gang of six senators on max baucus is committee was given the power to write the health care reform your problem is when you take the debate out of congress and stick it in a room without cameras and you take the american people out of the debate and in their absence special interests worm their way in that's baucus is gang of six took a combined eight million dollars in campaign contributions from the health care pharmaceutical and insurance industries it's no wonder that the final result of the negotiation was a bill that didn't have a public option and they gave the health insurance companies fifty million new customers that they could screw over and extract phones from to give to their c.e.o.'s for some reason even though they had huge majorities in the house and senate democrats outsourced writing a signature piece of legislation the health care bill three right wingers and three so-called moderate democrats who promptly threw all the progressive ideas into the fire on the first day. and in the end the gang of six

senator max baucus, "the president's budget strengthens our economy." senator ben cardin, "president obama has given us a credible blueprint." senator tom carper, "the president's budget is an important step forward." senator frank lautenberg, "president obama's budget presents a careful evaluation of what our nation needs." they all voted "no" last night. well, with frentdzs like that, you -- well, with friends like that you don't need enemies, as they like to saivment we will, , mr. bowles talked about the budget. he was rather stunned actually when it came out. came out i think on friday. and on sunday mr. bowles said, "it comes nowhere close to where they will have to go to avoid a fiscal night maimplet -- nightm" this is a man that president obama chose to head the deficit commission and he hammered this budget. said it is nowhere close. and it's nowhere close to doing what we have to do. so i just believe that what we went through yesterday was a sham, a mockery, a joke, had no meaning, it was nothing but politics, nothing but an avoidance of resp

senator max baucus, treasury secretary geithner, gene sperling, congressman eric kanter, and the omb director are all part of those discussions. back to "the baltimore sun" about speaker boehner's speech. it says "there must be honest conversations about the health care program." we will show you a little bit of that press conference, as well. first, let's go to your thoughts. margaret, an independent in indiana. what do you think? caller: i believe that the republicans are really trying to defeat obama and they are taking it out on the classes -- the poor people in the middle class -- to benefit themselves. host: margaret, are you still there? caller: yes. host: did you finish up? caller: yes. host: we will go on to mike in fredericksburg, virginia. caller: i have a question and comment. my question is, is it ever going to be time to stop raising the debt ceiling? speaker boehner is right that the entitlements are what is driving the debt. i do not think that speaker boehner or anybody else really wants to stand up and tell the truth about the situation. we have created a society th

senator max baucus sat on obama 's deficit-reduction panel last year and voted against its recommendations and has been pretty firm that there should not be any changes to entitlement programs. >> what is the goal of this plan versus what the gang of six has been working on? guest: it has been tough to say because the gang of six has been tight-lipped about what they're putting together. and this group is on having their first meeting today. we will see if anything comes out attacks. host: how seriously are you taking some of the reported stories i've read? here's another one. what should we read into that? guest: that's a pretty encouraging sign they are willing to reach a deal that falls short of what they want. ryan and eric cantor seemed to recognize that they probably will not get resolved and the tougher issues until after the next election, but perhaps we could find common ground on some of these last contentious elements and it has what it needs to allow the vote on raising the debt ceiling. host: if this comes to the floor where 87 new freshmen republicans have the tea party const