i heard alice rivlin on npr is said that during the last shut down, one of the things she was worried about was animals at nih. >> not decide understands completely the other side -- neither side understands completely the other side. consequences unforeseen. >> the madness of muammar gaddafi and a budget in -- the blood shed in libya. >> revolution. not civil war. only people against the regime. >> something extraordinary is happening in the middle east and that libya is the latest manifestation of it. gaddafi says protesters are on drugs and osama bin laden is behind the whole thing. any predictions as to how this will end, colby? >> it will end badly for him, and that will be a good thing. territory -- he has lost territory to the rebels. in tripoli, they are fighting a bloody resistance, but at the end of the day, he cannot hold the country. what does he get out of this? where does he go? >> what happens to libya at afterwards? is it another somalia, a haven for terrorists? what happens to the oil? >> it is only 2% of oil, but 2% is a lot. it is a special kind of oil and it has a

why not, with a little, it doesn't have to hurt people, you can do what rivlin and ryan do, you thrown health savings account, there i go again, joe. we'll make it worth their while and then we will raise premiums for the people who are above that bottom third. not that group up at 170 grand a year, but the group between whatever the number is, you know 30 grand a year and that number, make them pay more. why not? they're getting a huge, unearned freeby. that's a draconian proposal, but i think i want to contrast it to these sort of gdp growth plus 1% and other defined contribution formula, that's the rivlin-ryan formula. the problem with the formulas is that they are sort of -- they're relying on compound arithmetic. if you project the government will not pay more for your medicare premium, okay, than gdp growth plus 1% over the next 50 years, it turns out by the end of the 50th year, you're paying the premium. that's the power of the compounding or close to the entire premium. that's a bit draconian. even though it's gradual and each cohort that joins they won't see all the pain, so

what paul ryan and alice rivlin have done and hopefully others follow is put oit a model to keep it in the budget through premium support. it's no magic solution. it requires real sacrifices but it's an important structural change to keep health care in the budget. the other things the fiscal commission showed us is in order to meet the challenges, i think everything has to be back on the table. to give credit to paul rinl for specifics it was remarkable but his plan showed you can't get to a sustainable place without revenues because his plan takes a long time to get to where the debt levels are, wla would say is sustainable and if you put revenues on the table to fill in the gap after reforms then you have a deal people should talk about. the bowles/simpson commission like likewise has a detailed plan on social security reform. it doesn't structurally fix health care but it has $400 billion savings in health care. back to tom's point you have to talk about reducing health care costs and can't beat up people when they say we're going to make changes to medicare. we have to make change

. >> alice rivlin, brookings. your paper basically supports the role of government in affordable housing, both rental and homeownership, and suggests that we do it on budget, we appropriate balance for this rather than try to hide somewhere. that all seems to be good. but in a moment of great budget austerity, when everything will be facing cuts, will it be a hard sell for new kinds of programs that are oriented toward affordable housing? >> i think that it will. but as you know better than anybody, our long term fiscal sustainability problems are fundamentally about long term entitlements, particularly the cost of health care. i think we are as a nation can absolutely of ford to make in commit to a set of targeted levels for low and moderate- income americans and i think the challenges to do that in a way that is more targeted and transparent and on budget and more fair. i think that is something we can afford. as you know better than anybody, we're not going to solve long-term fiscal problems just by spending le

another bipartisan commission, the rivlin-domenici commission render the same advice.marc sandy and others have indicated that deep immediate cuts in contrast to irresponsible and planned cuts over period of time, that deep, immediate cuts could harm the fragile economy and hurt job growth." if you could please comment on the proposals today for deep and immediate cuts and the impact it would have on the economy and job growth, in your opinion. >> mr. van holland, i think we have a tough balance we have to strike. we agree that it would be a mistake to do drastic deficit reduction in this year that we are in a, beginning of next year. we had bipartisan agreement in december on the tax bill i largely because we could not afford to drag that a tax increase in general would have had. at the same time, need to focus on reducing spending and focus on making decisions that will turn the corner on the deficit, and we cannot really wait years to do that. our budget has a frame that we think is the right frame for making the tough tradeoffs. and we are going to have to work as

i'm one of those people like alison rivlin, we just don't quit. we are here. it was never -- social security was never intended to be the sole source of income. there was going to be savings and pensions. we know our rate of savings in this country went way down. it's coming up a little bit, thank heavens. it would weigh down. pension, defined pension plans is a thing that's going to be a memory that some people have them, and they are lucky. but future people will not have them. and now where we are right now is that one in three seniors absolutely rely on social security for 90% of their income. six out of ten for half of their income. and the benefits, as you said, when it can't be said enough. the benefits are not overly generous. i mean we're talking about an average of $14,000 a year for women $12,000. you try living on that. guess what, there's a lot of people that are living on it, and there's a lot of people that i want to be able to continue to live on it. and it's -- we have to keep remembering. when we had the last commissions. charles, by the way,

domenici rivlin was even more aggressive on the deficit reduction as well as the esquire commission, all of them bipartisan commission's. what would your advice to us the be in terms of the ten year plan? how aggressive should we be on the front end with imposing austerity, how big a change should we be seeking to achieve over a two-year window? >> his senator conrad, would generally endorsed timetable and the general tone of each of three commissions. manly that we don't have a short-term debt problem. we have an enormous long-term debt problem and we need to come to grips with that. if we had a short-term debt problem than market and market participants would be reflecting that, and one of the things we can use as a priority to engage in a we have a short-term debt problem is the responsibility of markets. when markets start to question whether or not you can serve as your debt, then you can see a rise in interest rates and a widening and spread relative to other benchmarks in the marketplace on a global basis. we don't have that yet. we enjoy lower interest rates and favorable bor

i'm one of those people like alison rivlin, we just don't quit. we are here. it was never -- social security was never intended to be the sole source of income. there was going to be savings and pensions. we know our rate of savings in this country went way down. it's coming up a little bit, thank heavens. it would weigh down. pension, defined pension plans is a thing that's going to be a memory that some people have them, and they are lucky. but future people will not have them. and now where we are right now is that one in three seniors absolutely rely on social security for 90% of their income. six out of ten for half of their income. and the benefits, as you said, when it can't be said enough. the benefits are not overly generous. i mean we're talking about an average of $14,000 a year for women $12,000. you try living on that. guess what, there's a lot of people that are living on it, and there's a lot of people that i want to be able to continue to live on it. and it's -- we have to keep remembering. when we had the last commissions. charles, by the way,

i am one of those people at alex rivlin, we just don't quit. we are here.but social security was never intended to be the sole source of income. they were going to be savings and pension in our rate of savings in this country were way down in the coming up a little bit, thank heavens. pensions -- defined pension plans are things that will be a memory, but some people have them and they are lucky, the future people will not hunt them. and now, where we are right now is that one in three seniors absolutely rely on social security for 90% of their income. excite a 10 have their income. it can be said enough. benefits are not overly generous. we're talking out an average of $14,000 a year. for women, $1237 a year. you try living on that. guess what, there's a lot of people living on it and a lot of people i want to be able to continue to live on it. and we have to keep remembering. we have the last commission. charles, by the way, i want to congratulate you. .. >> and why do i take time to go over these figures? because i think we have to. because right now the