party of eisenhower unlike today's republicans eisenhower's republican party could stomach a modest increase in taxes in today's taxes on the rich since the top marginal income tax rate during eisenhower's was over ninety percent that was a party that promoted spending more federal money for the good of the nation it was during the eisenhower administration that the interstate highway system was built just look at the republican party's official nine hundred fifty six platform and you'll see what that party used to stand for and how it's been utterly decimated by lunatics today the planks of that platform included programs of assistance to the millions of workers with special employment problems such as older workers and it kept workers members of minority groups and migratory workers it included help for the low wage workers and extended protection of the federal minimum wage laws to as many workers as is possible and practicable it included help for victims of discrimination with the pledge to continue to fight for the elimination of discrimination in employment because of race cr

ah, yes, republicans. michigan's congressional delegation will include almost twice as many republicans as democrats, even though more people in michigan picked a democrat when they voted for congress. republicans got nine seat and the democrats got five. what has happened in michigan is not some sort of miscounting of the votes. it is not a mistake. it is weird quite deliberately, and weird by design. elected officials draw up new districts for electing members of congress in state legislatures every ten years after the new census. well, republicans were in charge this time around in michigan, so it was the republicans who drew up the maps. and so republicans got themselves pretty good advantage. they got to decide how to clump voters in certain districts, how to divide voters in other districts so the election could produce the maximum number of republican candidates that conscience and the federal justice department would allow. that same dynamic at work that we saw in michigan, that same deal that play

during the republican years when republicans started drifting towards agreements to raise taxes, newte republicans. he wasn't willing to take on president reagan head on but in 1984 he actually called senator bob dole, quote, the tax collector for the welfare state. never mind that senator dole was doing president reagan's legislative bidding. he was condemned by then junior congressman gingrich just for considering tax increase. when bill clinton pushed for the tax increase that he got in 1993, newt gingrich said, quote, the tax increase will kill jobs. newt was opposed to all tax increases but he knew he couldn't simply say, i'm opposed to all tax increases. he had to come up with a reason. a reason that he could sell at least to other republicans. republicans who had voted for tax increases before. the tax increase will kill jobs. newt gingrich, who was not then the leader of the republicans in the house of representatives controlled every republican vote and every republican vote in the senate on bill clinton's deficit reduction bill. and because it cut spending but raised taxes,

beat other republicans. "since 2009 demint has raised more than $17 million to promote promising candidates in an effort to remake the senate not just in a republican image but in a diehard conservative one." the image of jim demint, even. and he has often done it by going to electoral war with his own party leadership. in the 2012 midterm elections demint threw his weight behind marco rubio in the republican primary for florida's senate race. despite the fact that the national republican senatorial committee and republican leader mitch mcconnell endorsed charlie crist in that race. marco rubio went on to win that primary and that senate seat. demint also backed rand paul in his primary. that was a fight, by the way, that took place in mcconnell's home state of kentucky and mcconnell endorsed the other guy. the not rand paul. but paul won. he won his senate race in kentucky which was deeply humiliating for mitch mcconnell. but demint has also backed a lot of candidates who won their primaries but did not go

republicans need a superhero to save them from this mess they're in. >> the republicans in the house have decided to run down an alley that has no exit. what i'm confident of is that they don't have at the end of that alley a bat plane to fly out to their own rescue. do you remember that scene? it was good. a good scene. >> does the president have a batplane? >> i can't talk about that. it's classified. >> joining me now is congressman chris van hollen of maryland. former dccc chairman. and i think he might be, knowing that this is a very serious time in american history, but there are moments of comedy coming out of the republican caucus tonight. congressman, there is breaking news from the hill right now. there will be no vote on plan b. the speaker has pulled his own bill. here is the statement his office has just released. "the house did not take up the tax measure today because it did not have sufficient support from our members to pass. now it is up to the president to work with senator reid on legislation and avert the fsical cliff. the house has already passed legislation to

>> brent, the republicans passed a bill. the republicans pass it had.en't passed a bill in 1300 days. you have to be kidding me. >> it's much easier for the democrats to sit and file their nails and say those awful republicans. look at those awful republicans go. the democrats haven't done anything. now what is the opposition to this super tax on the greedy rich? well, the republicans have argued for 20, 30, 40, 50 years that high taxes stifle economic growth. president obama said two years ago when he didn't do this two years ago, he said the wrong thing to do in a bad economy is to raise taxes. now suddenly both sides are considering doing exactly that. you've got three different studies of that shown that if you raise these taxes, you are going to kill somewhere between $700,000 and -- 700,000 and 1.1 million jobs. but all that not be standing, it has nothing to do with the issue. the issue has been, will continue to be, spending. >> okay. >> that's what no one wants to talk about. >> no, wait a second, brent. everybody wants to talk about it. i mean

meanwhile, these poll numbers also show republicans are can't handle losing the election. 25% of republicanthe union. and 19%, well, they're not really sure yet. it's safe to say that republicans are no longer the party of patriotism. a quarter of their members want nothing to do with this country. these misinformed republicans love to talk about our founding fathers. don't they always quote our founding fathers, those tea partyers out there? tonight identi've picked a quotm sheldon adelsoadelson's new boo. madison wrote, "a popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy or perhaps both. knowledge will forever governor ignorance. and a peep who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives." they were pretty smart back then. for more, let's turn to karen finney, msnbc political analyst and former dnc communications director. karen, 49% of republicans think a.c.o.r.n. stole this election. we've got a lot of work to do, don't we, houston? >> yeah, we sure do. >> what do you make of

simultaneously, you have republic republicans, not just moderate republicans but real conservative republicans saying we have to do what the president wants to do on taxes. right now and debate the other issues later down the road. i don't see democrats doing something of similar harassy on their side. the president controls the game. he's in the driver's seat the next couple months. >> why are republicans dissing a $600 billion cut? why do they say that's not a credible proposal? >> this is the process of negotiation. it's laughable in some respects they think the administration would come at them with something in the middle ground. that's what the administration did with the stimulus bill. one-third of it was tax cuts. they said from the get go, we're going to give republicans what they want. we expect them to meet in the middle. that's not what they did this time. this is where we are, we'll meet down here. republicans are going to do the same thing. they're going to say this is not a serious proposal. along the way, they are going to meet. it's going to be a proposal that doesn't have a t

it's not even a republican problem. it's a house republican problem. i think at some point in time, the president is going to have to change his message a little bit to make that abundantly clear to those americans that will listen. >> i hear your frustration and criticism with speaker boehner. a part of me feels sorry for him. >> i'm under the belief that president obama and speaker boehner in a room together can cut this deal. i think that boehner can't control his colleagues. >> well, yes, that's true and i've heard this sympathy for boehner idea today. i kind of share it. but on the other hand, really good politicians solve problems. he hasn't been able to solve that problem at all. look, the one thing, michael, i'm very much with you and with the folks you've been talking to in the sentiment to you and the president express. but i do want to avoid the puck is on both houses when you say democrats and republicans. at least the president has really come a long way. he gave the republicans a higher income tax threshold. he gave the chain cpi. he cut

>> i can't speak for republicans.ou don't hear me talking -- >> i think you want to chair the party. >> that's the reason -- >> you're going to have to speak for these clowns. >> for that reason. but, you know, you have to carry baggage of democrats that i have heard you over the years disagree with them. >> i have. >> i do think that there has to be a different tone -- >> do you agree these are dog whistles, these are signals to people we don't like black presidents, food stamps and -- >> the birther thing -- >> but the food stamps, the dependency message. >> i think it's unfair for john -- to paint with a broad brush and say that all republicans agree -- >> sununu was one of the number one surrogates they were putting out, and he was all over the place. >> but, chris, i was critical of the romney folks. they had no diversity in their campaign, and i was critical in 2008 because they had no diversity. >> that also plays -- >> we have to make some news. this is a news show. mr. watts, u.s. congressman watts, you have

you have republicans not just sort of modern republicans, but real conservative republicans saying we got to do what the president wants to do on taxes and debate the other issues later down the road. i don't see democrats doing something of similar hair si on their side. the president controls the game. >> why are the republicans disz dising a $600 billion cut? why do they say that's not a credible proposal? >> it's laughable, in some respects, that they think the administration would come at them with something in the middle ground. that's what they did with the stimulus. they said from the get go, we're going to give republicans what they want. we expect them to meet in the middle. republicans are going to do the same thing. this is not a serious proposal. along the way, they are going to meet. it's going to be a proposal that doesn't have a trillion dollars in tax rates. >> some conservatives are encouraging republicans to go off the cliff. >> they obviously expect republicans will cave on everything. i think republicans ought to simply walk away. >> limbaugh said the same thing a

will republicans cave? donna gentile-o'donnell and michael eric dyson join us for the discussion. >>> and chris christie becomes the latest republican governor to reject a state-run health insurance exchange. he's leaving it up to the feds. former governor howard dean will weigh in. stay tuned. >>> if congress does nothing, every family in america will see their income taxes automatically go up on january 1st. i'm assuming that doesn't sound too good to you. that's sort of like the lump of coal you get for christmas. that's a scrooge christmas. >> welcome back to "the ed show." president obama will hit the road again monday bringing his message to the people of detroit. the president has asked the american people to put pressure on congress to accept a deal in fiscal cliff negotiations. the white house is pulling out all stops and cranking up the social media campaign. president obama has been encouraging supporters to tweet with the #my2k, explaining what a $2,000 tax increase would mean for them and their

and republicans see the writing on the wall. the republican crackup is not yet an avalanche. it is not yet a complete capitulation. but i think that john boehner understands and the republican leadership understands it's only a matter of time. but there is not much time left. >> richard, okay, that sounds like an inherently logical position. >> right. >> that they may be cracking, that there may be a deal done. that seeming crackage, if you will, seems to be happening among republicans who are actual legislator. >> right. >> but conservatives do not seem to be going quietly into the night. erick erickson writing on redstate has a new petition, and he has joined sean hannity in this in calling for people to fight against the reelection of john boehner as speaker of the house. he writes on his blog, we must make sure boehner does not buckle this year. it gets easier after the new year. redstate has a fire boehner petition online for voters to sign. it reads in part in order to save the future of our country, we need to stop those in congress who aren't willing to put their foot

that's precisely the problem republicans face now.ecause saying yes means agreeing month each other as opposed to opposing the president. saying yes at this point is extremely difficult as a big loss in this strategy is that john boehner is now sidelined. he's just not a relevant part of these discussions and that's a major defeat. >> so it's about mitch mcconnell then? >> the senate minority leader is the most important figure in the republican party today. who could have predicted that, even two, three months ago? >> were you surprised when you heard he called vice president joe biden and said, we need you i guess is what we must have said? >> mcconnell cut the deal earlier about the payroll tax cut extension. so he has a track record, in spite of his rhetoric and saying that his number one priority was making sure president obama was a one-term president, he has managed to cut deals before and joe biden has cut deals, as well. so it doesn't surprise me that's where it's headed. but maybe his relationship with joe biden is better th

so, yes, republicans will give in.y have made a huge move after two decades when, you know, grover norquist enforced very strictly this pledge that said no tax increases ever. you know, over my dead body. republicans have made a very significant move that says, okay. we will accept some tax increases. but let's remember, there are some very important details to be worked out. how much and when. will they just say, okay, we will stand aside while democrats pass this tax cut for the middle class and then let the tax cuts for the wealthy engs pyre? that could happen. but does it happen before the end of the year? does it happen after the end of the year? >> now, dana, on that point, a lot of this is that they seem to have already lost the american public. in a new series of polls. quinnipiac shows that americans have views close to the president. 65% say raise taxes on $250,000 plus. 85% of polls pledged against raising taxes. that's 85%. 51% think that the gop is negotiating in bad faith. so the public seems to be gone f

republican senator. they think he is not right wing enough. chuck hagel does not just have critics on the right, though. on the left there is rumbling that democratic presidents should stop putting republicans in the secretary of defense job like bill clinton did with bill cohen and president obama already did once with bob gates. calling it the bizarre tradition of sorts where democratic presidents suddenly act like republicans are right, that only they, republicans, can run our national security affairs. so there is general criticism from the left that democrats should stop bolstering the myth that republicans are stronger on defense because they're republicans, and therefore, only republicans should run defense even when a democrat is president. but there is also this one very specific criticism of chuck hagel individually. it's not a general criticism. it's about his record. back when it was mr. hagel who had the power to confirm presidential nominees or deny them, back when he was a united states se

side, -- cohesion on the republican side.ispier i dispiern this. not just among leadership but voting public people are burnt out. lou: what have they done? you have to work hard to get burned out. >> they have not done that. >> and tea party on the rise again. i think that stronger better republican party in two years from, last cycle. watch this whole fiscal cliff dial backfire. the -- the economy is going into recession in new year. lou: do you believe there is no way to avoid the fiscal cliff.

will republicans cave?entile-o'donnell and michael eric dyson join us for the discussion. >>> and chris christie becomes the latest republican governor to reject a state-run health insurance exchange. he's leaving it up to the feds. former governor howard dean will weigh in. stay tuned. people have doubts about taking aspirin for pain. but they haven't experienced extra strength bayer advanced aspirin. in fact, in a recent survey, 95% of people who tried it agreed that it relieved their headache fast. visit fastreliefchallenge.com today for a special trial offer. now we need a little bit more... [ male announcer ] at humana, we understand the value of quality time and personal attention. which is why we are proud to partner with health care professionals who understand the difference that quality time with our members can make... that's a very nice cake! ohh! [ giggles ] [ male announcer ] humana thanks the physicians, nurses, hospitals, pharmacists and other health professionals who helped us achieve the h

will republicans cave? genteel-o'donnell and michael eric dyson join us for the discussion. >>> and chris christie becomes the latest republican governor to reject a state-run health insurance exchange. he's leaving it up to the feds. former governor howard dean will weigh in. stay tuned. of washington about the future of medicare and social security. anncr: but you deserve straight talk about the options on the... table and what they mean for you and your family. ancr: aarp is cutting through all the political spin. because for our 37 million members, only one word counts. get the facts at earnedasay.org. let's keep medicare... and social security strong for generations to come. [ male announcer ] this december, remember -- what starts with adding a friend... ♪ ♪ ...could end with adding a close friend. ♪ the lexus december to remember sales event is on, offering some of our best values of the year. this is the pursuit of perfection. if you're a man with low testosterone, you should know that axiron is her

we don't believe in democracy thread that runs the republican party. straddling burke back in the late eighteenth century you know thomas paine went over to england on his way of the french revolution and spent two weeks from burke's home and ended up with these huge fight that he literally wrote a book as a rebuttal to berg which was which was the rights of man and burke rather famously said words to the effect of i'm probably doing this badly from memory but it does mean no harm if a man wants to engage in a profession as serve as that of tallow maker or hairdresser but it does society considerable violence of such a man is allowed to participate in governance another reason about how is burke who is considered the godfather of american conservatism russell kirk and in his book the opens it up with other people have nothing more to do can with conservatism than lenin i mean they they don't nothing that people like and ran during you know control or conservative heroes and of course she was not conservative at all but keep in mind that the founding fa

he could have gotten 200 republican votes.would have needed about 20 democratic votes, all right? >> this plan "b"? >> yes, the democrats have been for that. this time they weren't. so this is something the president used to be for. the democrats used to be for. >> you're saying the democrats are difficult. >> i'm saying, look. the president wants a deal, as you said, he can get a deal today. okay? you go back in history, you look at down points, crises in economic history. look at herbert hoover's period. nobody at that period remembers who the speaker of the house was. they remember hoover. >> yeah. >> nobody in history is going to remember who the speaker was now. they'll remember barack obama. is the president ready to lead and work with boehner on something in which he can deliver, a coalition of republicans and democrats? >> dan, it's true, you could get a deal today by saying the threshold's $1 million, and what do you have? >> or $550,000. >> you have complete junk. you'd wreck the country, then. >> you think what's go

. 53% say it's on republicans. half that, 27%, will blame the president. this is progress. this is change. if president obama can break republicans on tax increases, this could redefine american politics. it would help to change our politics in very important ways. and who knows what else may be possible. joining me now is krystal ball and richard wolffe. thank you for being here tonight. >> thanks, reverend. >> thanks, reverend. krystal, how big a moment will it be if the president gets the republicans to cave on tax increases? >> i mean, it really is sort of hard to understate how significant that would be. it would es seshlgsentially mar end of when george w.h. bush led taxes. we had the contract for america. that in some ways was the precursor of the tea party and this very extreme rhetoric, us versus them rhetoric, where rather than talking about nuance differences between positions you call the president's health care bill socialism and yell about death panels and caricature things. that could be the most imp

keep in mind, the republicans have come in awful -- i'm not being reflexive defender of the republican me. but they have come a long way. $800 billion in tax increase? i don't care what they call them. these are tax increases. they are offending their base. white house has not one offer to curtail the entitlement in any way. drivers of the debt and deficit. they need to ring something out of the white house on that side of the equation. >> one thing to understand, when we hear the president say rates have to go up. there is no other way to make this work. this is a purely political statement, it has nothing to do with economics. his own commission, the debt reduction commission he pinted identified $1.1 trillion of what are called the tax expenditures. meaning loopholes and deductions out there. available every year. so over a decade that is $11 trillion of available revenues without raising rates. so all you need to do is get less than one in ten of the dollars. one in ten. you've got a $1 trillion in raised revenues without raising rates. the only reason the president insists on rais

gay republicans out there. what should they do to change their platform. >> we need to be involved in the party process. you need to be a delegate to the convention. you need to be a delegate on the platform committee. be involved in your state party, involved in state parties like oregon where they changed their platform. you need to be involved in state party politics and that's how we get involved in the national party. that's how it works. so you don't want to depend on a surrogate per se. >> why can't republicans lean forward or backward? >> forward. >> good. thank you clark cooper, joan walsh. >>> coming up. when charlie crist made it official and make a democrat, he bap the first big state governor to switch sides since john conley of texas became a republican. the gop has declared war on it's moderat moderates. the former and perhaps future governor of florida, charlie crist joins us tonight. >>> president obama is campaigning and republicans are considering. will the president gain a small victory on t

it was the end of the republican party. at the end, the republicans nominated a man named richard nixon. and he became president. unthinkable. >> so you can have a tcampaign between hillary clinton and jeb bush, representing 36 years of bushes on national tickets. and i think 38 years of the clintons at state or federal government. >> back to the future. what about chris christie? he was on jon stewart this week. we have a clip. let's show it. it was a funny moment. >> the week before the storm, you were out there, president obama couldn't lead his way out of a paper bag with a fistful of 20s. and then right after the storm was over, you were like, this man is a leader. doesn't that tell you something about the game? what does that tell you about the game? >> what it tells me is people have different skill sets at different times. that's what it does. [ laughter ] >> i see. >> so he wasn't a leader until you needed leadership. >> maybe until he was presented with a stark opportunity to lead. >> chris christie is a very popu

i'm not sure the tea party republicans quite get the message, but there are many moderate republicans who understand the factual that what the president put forth and american people voled for is the very much rich, million ayres and billionaires need to pay their fair share and we need to end the tax cuts for these individuals who really don't really understand -- who really don't need that and who are willing to allow these. when you talk middle income people the poor, we cannot allow the most vulnerable, our senior citizens to pay for these tax cuts of the very wealthy. that was the message of the campaign and some republicans really understand. >> eliot: john boehner harnessed the tea party many thought john boehner wanted to move forward the middle and the far right keeping him they tethered. >> his hand should be stronger and he should be a stronger leader. he should be able to bring forward members of his party to get enough votes to make sure these bush tax cuts for the very wealthy end. he should be able to do that. you know, he leads their party. he leads their caucus and he

but heartland, republican votersuance real republicans not middle of the road compromisers. is real republican. >> this is a non-carolina things to do. thurman served a million years in the senate. matthews until he was 100 years old. shocking thing for him the do. as far as the succession is concerned, i have been told today that jim demint asked governor haley specifically to appoint tim scott as the successor. just a few minutes ago he said no, i didn't. it didn't do it. >> bret: he wouldn't talk about it. that's why i didn't ask him. >> talked about the congressional delegation. he wants the successor from the current republican congressional delegation. but i think there is a lot of momentum building already for tim scott. >> bret: that is it for the panel. stave tuned to see who is challenging justin bieber for twitter supremacy. ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] campbell's green bean casserole. it's amazing what soup can do >> bret: finally tonight there is a new loomary on twitter pope benedict already has more than half a million followers. we heard that he will officially sta

party i didn't leave the republican party it left me even current republican members of congress are openly talking about what's wrong with their party after speaker that is john boehner his plan b. failed last week as proving that even the smallest tax increase on the smallest group of rich americans camp as the republican house republican congressman steve la tourette blasted the tea party wing of his party saying it's the continuing dumbing down of the republican party and we are going to be seen more and more as a bunch of extremists that can't even get a majority of our own people to support policies that we're putting forward is singled out forty chuckleheads that all you have screwed this place up and in the editorial pages of today's financial times an op ed asked about the future of the republican party and described the faltering party this way today's republican party is a bit like a headless body striking out blindly against change. with this sort of talk making the rounds of serious publications like the financial times clearly something is wrong the republican party whi

why do republicans want that? basically their focus is if they are giving on tax increases which we get the indication they are willing to do at least to some degree they would like to see something that addresses the long-term deficit. whether that can happen in this deal seems to be the problem. democrats have said if they can get something bigger they would be open to changes in entitlements. that is where things stand. there is clearly even handed on both sides saying they want to get things done. you know the clock is running and those signs make everyone think this may not resolve itself tonight. >> thank you very much. >>> let's go to the white house and kristen welker. hi there. >> reporter: hi, there. the white house is not commenting on these developments. senior administration officials say the action is going on on the hill right now. they are hesitant to weigh in. they don't want to disrupt any progress or setbacks that may be in the process of being resolved. so that is what the white house is saying

republican and because 21st first century republicans know that abraham lincoln is the only republicanmire. abraham lincoln is also the only republican president, indeed the only president who has ever gotten a republican house of representatives to raise income taxes. republicans didn't just establish the very first income tax as i just described under president lincoln. two years later, they raised the rates. they doubled the top tax rate from 5% to 10%. that's back when republicans were responsible. 150 years ago. the last time a republican house of representatives won a war was the civil war. they couldn't have done it without raising income taxes. in that 1913 constitutional amendment that finally and forever cemented congress' right to raise income taxes, that constitutional amendment was approved by a republican house of representatives. [ male announcer ] this is joe woods' first day of work. and his new boss told him two things -- cook what you love, and save your money. joe doesn't know it yet, but he'll work his way up from busser to waiter to chef before opening a restauran

it plays far worse for republicans. i think this conversation, the longer it goes on, the more i'm convinced that we're going over the cliff. if you have the democrats saying absolutely we're not getting there without raising the rates on that top 2% and you have republicans saying that's a poison pill we're not doing that, then we're going to go over the cliff and it's going to be far worse for republicans. the polling you just cited. i mean i think what's astonishing is the republicans saying, it didn't hurt us last time when we didn't do anything, when we almost defaulted over the debt ceiling. didn't hurt you? i think when you look at the results of the last election, yes, they held the house with a lot of redistricting but even with that redistricting i think that's going to be a lot tougher for them in two years if they do this. >> that is a really interesting point. the conventional wisdom is president obama ended up bloodied in that fight, ben, and in reality, i think you could take 2012 as a referendum on how t