you're the director of the omb, does your budget -- >> our budget is a more honest budget. it looks at what's happening. >> will the witness not answer this simple question? i just asked a simple question. >> it's a more accurate reflection of what we're going to spend. >> will it spend more or less? >> just some of the exchanges earlier today on capitol hill as members of the president's administration provide details to members of congress on the 2013 spending blueprint that, exchange with senator jeff sessions, republican of alabama and acting director of office of management and budget, jeffrey zients. a new poll out showing rick santorum and mitt romney essentially tied in the race. this the latest from the abc news/"washington post" poll. also showing rick santorum is increasing his popularity, all coming a week and a day before the next debate that will take place in two weeks before the next round of primaries in arizona and in michigan. a couple of new ads on the air in michigan. meanwhile the hill newspaper reporting negotiators could close the deal tonight that wo

you're the director of the omb. does your budget call for spending more money. >> our budget is a more honest budget that looks at what's happening in a business as usual basis. each year we pass the amt. >> will the witness answer the simple question? i just asked a simple question. >> it's a more accurate reflection of what we're going to spend. >> will it spend more or less? >> just some of the exchanges earlier today on capitol hill as members of the president's administration provide details to members of congress on the 2013 spending blueprint. that exchange with senator jeff sessions, republican of alabama, and the acting director of the office of management and budget, jeffrey zions before the senate budget committee. welcome to hour one of "washington today" on c-span radio. thanks for being with us. a new poll out showing that rick santorum and mitt romney essentially tied in the race. this is the latest from the abc news/"washington post" poll. the survey shows rick santorum is increasing his popularity a

was that part of the submittal to omb? because that doesn't sound like you're giving twick card consideration. >> sir, i believe that is part of the submittal to omb, and what i am trying to convey here is that we are looking at all of the opportunities to leverage the various cards and want very much to go in the direction that you want to go. >> well, and i know there may need to be an interagency memorandum to work together, and i know sometimes our federal agencies don't like to do that. but we have -- it's redundant information if we're using the same database. and i just don't understand why dhs, as we proposed in two separate legislations earlier, harmonized twick with the background check. is there an incident that i'm not aware of that have existed within the twick system that required dhs to go beyond twick? >> i'm not aware of any, sir. >> okay. and it seems to me, because i try to stay pretty close to the ground there with a lot of my folks, and i have not heard one in our area. people may not like some of the c

the i.d. when submitted to omb? >> davy? >> the leveraging of twick and other credentials is part of the information collected and submitted to omb. >> i would see comfortable seeing in writing what you said, secretary beers, that the twick card -- again, we have hundreds of thousands around the country, that we don't want to also have a breakdown in redoing something. i know working with the industry and the bargaining units and everything else is something that ought to be important, and i know i'm over my time, mr. chairman. i have a number of other questions i'd like to submit if we don't have time today. >> without objection, i think my colleague and i would like to recognize mr. murphy from pennsylvania, the undersecretary of the committee, for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. secretary beers, the memo states that cfas must critically evaluate and conduct mid and long-range planning. so to that end, let me ask for your candid responses. why was this not done until now? >> i beg your pardon? >> why was some of t

lew as the director understood that we were going nowhere, we finally had a meeting of the minds between omb, the white house and the congress. >> let's make sure that we continue those dialogues. >> very good. all right. i want to ask you about housing. we have tried a bunch of programs. we have tried the home affordable modification program, hamp. we have tried the home affordable refinance program, h.a.r.p., and then the hardest hit fund. what makes this most recent attempt to help homeowners different? >> this is a hard problem and the housing market is starting to stabilize and it's a mix. it needs a lot of work. i think the settlement last week is an important settlement. that will get the money out to approximately 2 million homeowners to help with modification and refinancing. the program that the president just announced which takes advantage of one of those charts that we talked about earlier, the historic low interest rates, we have too many homeowners paying interest rates above the rates. yet they're stuck and they're current and in the president's program which he announced, wi

on the omb-ay. y hebrew i know. >> impressive. >> stephen: is the youth of military power in an elected way, is that a foreign policy tool or is that a foreign policy failure? >> sometimes it's a failure and sometimes it's a tool. i think when we're dealing with will it's qaddafi, the that president obama decided to use military force to destroy qaddafi because he was about to kill tens of thousands if not more people. >> stephen: you're not giving credit to obama for anything very r you? >> i do. >> stephen: how can you advise romney and like anything obama did? (laughter) >> i think when the president does the right thing it doesn't matter what party you're in. >> stephen: but the president has done nothing right in foreign policy, okay? (laughter) bin laden? doesn't count. (laughter) killing al-awlaki doesn't count. qaddafi doesn't count. supporting the arab spring doesn't count. so what else has he done. (laughter) >> he's done some things wrong h. he has a good policy in area, particularly in de

i think we need to work with the omb lawyers to see exactly what would be the case. but make no mistake, i don't think anybody questions that at the account level. that would be have to be equal in percentage terms. and i think that fits the meat axe description pretty well. if you have to do it every account by the same percent. this is a bad idea. it's bad policy. and i really hope that the congress will take the steps to detrigger it. >> it seems my time is expired. i'm getting the gavel. so thank you, mr. chairman, thank you all. >> we're trying to adhere closely to the five, because we promised the secretary to get him out of here by noon. >> thank you. let me get right to it. i want to talk, mr. secretary, first, about the guard and the reserve. you and i have talked about this in the past. in my view, their unique expertise and their ability to adapt rapidly to mission requirements. it's one of the reasons we ought to be especially careful in this time of making tough choices with respect to what happens with the guard and reserve. this year, you're all going

whether that's a likely partat that's the end-point of the distribution and also again about the of the omb delay in submitting the budget. >> yes, i'm sorry. on the economic question, this2 30, the upper right corner for gdp. we show the effect on gdp on the output made in this country from minus 2.1%, to plus 0.2%. so what that means is the buyer modeling under certain sets of assumptions, it's possible the gdp would be slightly higher in 2022. however, it's important to understand the limitations of that estimate. the first is the point i made which is that we'll be possibly producing a little more here. but the larger share of the return to that production will be going overseas. so the standard of living of americans, based much more on gnp will be down in 2022 for any of the range of assumptions we use. moreover, the table went out further, what you would see is even that plus 0.2 in the upper right corner disappear and become negative. >> there's a certain year where it would be negative? >> yes. and the reason for that is there are essentially two opposing, opposing forces at work h

i also want you to know that president obama's proposal, much of which we have incorporated, the omb estimate is that it saves $500 million over ten years. >> over ten years. >> yes. >> was the billion each year, so that's about $50 million a year, so maybe 5% reduction in cost. does that sound about right? you said 500 -- >> $500 million over ten years. >> that was the obama administration's estimate for across the board savings. >> across the board. >> we actually believe that this proposal will save more than that. although it hasn't been financially estimated yet. >> right. >> and actually, in that regard, we're kind of giving something to the supercommittee as it does its work to try to bring this back in balance. >> keep in mind, the postal employees are disproportionately represented in that poll. that's why there are more savings that will accrue to the postal service. >> right. >> further debate? hearing none, senator carper, would you like to respond? >> mr. chairman, in the case of reductions at retirement age, i find that 38 states do not have any reduction at retirement a

threat turned out to be nothing after the obama administration said you don't have to subpoena anyone, the ombs free to come testify anytime you wish. back to you. >>> thank you, scott. tomorrow, the world will look on as friends and family say their final good-bye to whitney houston. at 9:00 our time, that's pacific time, mourners will gather at houston's childhood church in her hometown of newark, new jersey, for a private funeral service. among those invited houston's ex-husband bobbi brown, kevin costner, her co-star in "the bodyguard" and oprah winfrey. clive davis will speak at tomorrow's funeral. houston's god mother, aretha franklin, will perform. the service will be live stream on the web at 9:00 pacific time. we'll have a link to watchç itn our website, logon to nbc bay area.com. >>> coming up, 4,000 passengers left high and dry after an airline suddenly goes belly up. >>> ah, the life of a hamster. coming up, we take you live to the south bay for the travel and adventure show. certainly living up to its name th m andcoore r that and more coming up in a live report. ♪ [ male announc

and we took documentation that we ran through the omb that

you're the director of the omb. do you call for spending more money -- >> a more honest budget that looks at what is happening in the business as usual basis. each year we are passing. >> i just asked a simple question. >> it is a more accurate reflection of what we are going to spend. >> will it spend more or less? >> it will actually spend less money because of the deficit reduction that we have come and a baseline and reflect of the current policy. >> because of the deficit reduction can only be assumed that caused by increased taxes. but let's go back to that question. you're budget proposes eliminating the sequester than the $1.2 trillion of spending cuts we all agreed to last year difficult as it was that is a trillion dollar increase in spending is not? >> no, it's not. >> why is it not? we agreed that the current law is to cut and reduce the projected spending rate by $1.2 trillion you eliminate that and that means you intend to spend that, do you not? >> this is a very important point. the president is not p

>> i believe that is part of the submittal to omb. we're looking at all of the opportunities to leverage the various cards and want very much to go in the direction that you want to go. >> and i know there may need to be an interagency memorandum to work together, and i know sometimes our federal agencies do not like to do that. but we have redundant information if we are using the same data base. i just do not understand why dhs, as we proposed in two separate legislation to earlier, with aze twidc background check. is there an incident that i am not aware of that existed within the twic system but that required dhs to go beyond twic? >> i am not aware of any, sir. >> i stay pretty close to the ground there with a lot of my folks, and i have not heard one. in our area, people may not like some of the chemicals we produce, but they're produced because somebody needs them in our country. and we want to make sure there safely produce, both for the people who live around it and for the folks on that plant. every time i talk about the issu

you are the director of omb. >> the budget is a more honest budget that looks at what's happening in a business as usual. each year we are passing the amt. >> the witness is not answering a simple question. >> it is a more accurate reflection of what we're going to spend. >> will it spend more or less? >> it will actually spend less money because of the deficit reduction we have and the baseline of the reflection of the current policy. >> because of the deficit reduction that is caused by increased taxes. let's would back to the question. your budget proposes eliminating the sequester, the $1.2 trillion in spending cuts we all agreed to last year, difficult as it was, that's a $1.2 trillion increase in spending, is it not? >> no, it isn't. >> why is it not? we agreed to current law to cut reduced projected spending rate by $1.2 trillion. you eliminate that. that means you intend to spend that, do you not? >> this is a very important point. the president is not proposing that the sequester go away. the sequester is a very important forcing function for us to do deficit reduction. so t

cms, the agency that oversees medicare and medicaid and we took documentation that we ran through the omb and shows oregon say the federal government's $15 billion over the last 20 years and we can save them $20 billion in the next 10 years with her new health care reform. we asked them for several hundred million dollars a year each year for the next five years to help us make this transition and the response was extraordinarily positive. [applause] so what that means this will most likely have the resources necessary to make this transition for those dollars will not come to oregon to pop up the current delivery model. he will pull through the care organizations that will produce savings over the next 10 years. selecting early in february to authorize the full bill of the health insurance exchange and not brace expansion of the coordinated care organization gives the only chance we've got to create a health care system that's actually financially sustainable. we have an opportunity to help inform the national debate and also put us in a position to weather the economic storm that is sur

the omb, they were kind of rolling their eyes, we don't know about this company.s. it will be an interesting tale and definitely interesting between now and friday morning. >> greta: we'll see who blinks first. joe, thank you. >>> straight ahead, a street sweeper strikes goal. you will not believe he pulled out of a dirty drain. and new set back for martha stewart, what is it this time? not what you think but do you want to know, so you need to stay tuned. [ male announcer ] we know you don't wait until the end of the quarter to think about your money... ♪ that right now, you want to know where you are, and where you'd like to be. we know you'd like to see the same information your advisor does so you can get a deeper understanding of what's going on with your portfolio. we know all this because we asked you, and what we heard helped us create pnc wealth insight, a smarter way to work with your pnc advisor, so you can make better decisions and live achievement. oh! [ baby crying ] ♪ what started as a whisper ♪ every day, millions of people choose to do the right t

the omb, they were kind of rolling their eyes, we don't know about this company.s got rough times. it will be an interesting tale and definitely interesting between now and friday morning. >> greta: we'll see who blinks first. joe, thank you. >>> straight ahead, a street sweeper strikes goal. you will not believe he pulled out of a dirty drain. and new set back for martha stewart, what is it this time? not what you think but do you want to kno there's another way to help eliminate litter box dust: purina tidy cats. our premium litters now work harder to help neutralize odors in multiple cat homes. purina tidy cats. keep your home smelling like home. gives you a 50 percent annual bonus. so you earn 50 percent more cash. if you're not satisfied with 50% more cash, send it back! i'll be right here, waiting for it. who wouldn't want more cash? [ insects chirping ] i'll take it. i'll make it rain up in here. [ male announcer ] the new capital one cash rewards card. the card for people who want 50% more cash. what's in your wallet? sorry i'll clean this up. shouldn't ha

as the chairman said before i joined omb three years ago and i feel i'm in a good position today to talk about the president's budget. but before that, i spent thmore than 20 years in the private sector and one thing i found helpful was to boil things down to a few graphics. so if it's okay i thought i would use my minutes walking through the highlights of the budget using, i hope, these two screens. i'll cover four topics, first the policy baseline, and the key elements of deficit reduction and the investments of the areas that is important to aggravated burglary -- that is important to jobs and growth and how it puts us on a sustainable path. let's start with the baseline. we believe we have a baseline that reflects current policy. in essence this is business as as usual. the baseline includes the extension of the 2001, and 2003 tax cuts, estate and gift taxes. second, the permanent extension of a and t and sgr, we believe this presentation is more honest than patching these year after year. enforcement of the bca caps and joint committee sequester and accounting for future disaster co

of cms, the agency that oversees medicare and medicaid and we took documentation and ran through the omb and showed that oregon saved $15 billion over the last 20 years on the oregon health plan and we can save $20 billion in the next ten years with our new health care reform and we asked them for several hundred million dollars a year each year for the next five years to make this transition and response was extraordinarily positive. [applause] that means we will have the resources necessary to make this transition. those dollars are not going to come to oregon to prop up the delivery model. they will flow through the coordinated care organization that will actually produce those savings over the next ten years. acting early in february to authorize the bill out of the health insurance exchange and authorize the expansion of coordinated care organization gives oregon the best and perhaps only chance we have got to create health care system that is sustainable. beyond that we have an opportunity to help reform the national debate and put us in position to weather the economic storm that

last week the office omb said law would not be fully implemented until, can you believe it, december 2014. in the absence of final guidance companies cannot prepare to comply with the law, cms does not seem to be taking this seriously or working to implement the law with any sense of urgency. your agency has implemented many other provisions of the health care reform law already. just think of all the ones you've already put out. the longer you delay the provision, the longer consumers will have to wait to learn about financial relationships between their doctors, drug and medical device companies. how can you wait until december 2014 to issue a final regulation when the law requires companies to begin reporting information march 2013. >> i want to clarify. the final rule -- the rule has been finalized and is out and available. we are talking about a timetable for reporting. this is a balancing act. i share concerns about relationships that may influence their health care provider's decision. health care providers are concerned that additional reporting requirements may impede their a

and last week the office omb said law would not be fully implen

the committee. before i joined omb through years ago, i spent all of my time, about 20 years, in the private sector. one thing that i found was that it was often helpful to boil things down to a few key graphics. so, i'll use some graphics here on the screen to walk through the highlights of the president's 2013 budget. i'll cover four topics. first, the current policy baseline. second, the key elements of deficit reduction. then an overview of the investments in the areas that are critical to the future competitiveness and growth and finally, the bottom line of the president's budget and how it puts us on a sustainable path. first, the baseline. we believe we have a baseline that accurately reflects current policy. in essence, in business, we think of this as business as crucial. the baseline includes the extension of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts and estate cuts. the extension of the amt and sgr, the presentation we believe is more honest than patching these year after year. enforcement of the bca caps and joint committee sequester. and accounting for future disaster costs rather than ignoring them.

you is while calculating the impact the change in life for accounting methods in terms of the revenue sides has omb calculated. the other implications, economically, of that change including the possible death of some businesses in the country. >> right. on the lifo, that disproportionately benefits oil and gas producers who have record profits. there was a lot of game that can go on through that lifo system. the treasury secretary is the point person on specifics around individual tax policies. so i'll have to defer to geithner on the calculation and how cost to benefits are weighed. >> i appreciate that. i have raised that with secretary geithner as well. quick question. when i'm home this weekend and anymore costco, mr. simpson says people don't care about it. if i'm walking through costco and kroger or someplace and a citizen says, why should i care whether this is a -- the deficit, debt, percentages of gdp as opposed to nominal numbers, whether it's the $11 trillion here in this calculation or in the republican budget that was passed last year, the $6 trillion, why does that matter to the aver

for in this case omb actually did it the way i think we'd want them to do in terms of calculating the likely outcome. now, i just want to end with this. because i do have -- [ no audio ] i have to leave early because i have to sign the payroll tax cut conference. you raised the issue. the chairman raised the issue. fundamentally we've got to figure out a way to come together to resolve these issues. there are some basic disagreements. we believe it's important in the

as the chair han said, before i joined omb three years ago, and i have now been there for three years and been involved in the budget, so i feel like i'm in a good position to talk about the president's budget. but before that, i spent 20 years in the private sector. one thing i found that was helpful in the private sector is to boil things down to a few graphics. so it's okay if everybody, i thought i would use my few minutes to walk you through the highlights of the budget using i hope these two screens. i'll cover first the current policy baseline. next, the key elements of deficit reduction. and then and overview of our investments. and finally the bottom like of the president's budget. let me start with the baseline. we believe we have a baseline that accurately reflects current policy. in essence, this is business as usual. the baseline includes the extension of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, estate and gift taxes. second, the permanent extension of amt and sgr, we believe this presentation is more honest and enforcement of the joint committee sequester and accounting for future di

get ready to do trade the close. acting ombirector, jeffrey zients is talking about the president's budget and why it calls for a more than doubling dividend of the tax rate for some americans. here is how the dow is shaping up. we are up 70 points on the dow. >>> big day at the nasdaq, genron leading, up 2.5%. as it's raised their out look for their ilia, that is the aging blindness drug that they have. and expedia which is up 84% and now, apple is only up 42%, but of course, we are watching to see if tit closes above $500 today but the bigger milestone could be when it hits $500 billion market cap. and believe it or not, analysts say it could be the cheapest $500 billion tech stock ever. >> it's not what it used to be. >> not at these multiples. >> thank you, see you later. 17 minutes left. time for a stat, check the comp osite, the volatility index is ba back below 20. the yellow flag, no longer being waived by the fear indicator. sue? >> at least not today, anyway. thanks bill. markets are continuing to climb higher as bill

. >> that tells you that the enemy is the omb. >> in this case, the omb actually did the way i think would want them to do in terms of documenting the likely outcome. now, i just got to end with this because i do have -- >> [unintelligible] >> i have to lead to design something with another group but fundamentally, we have got to figure out a way to come together to resolve these issues. there are some basic disagreements. we believe it is important in the short term to continue to take measures that are described in the president's budget to boost job growth. i remember more than one year ago, our colleagues were pointing to the new government in the u.k. as an example of how we should proceed here. we should have an austerity budget. i think the secretary can talk about what the growth numbers are in the u.k. these days. they are not very good. it is a good thing we did not follow that proposal. the second is a balanced approach. the secretary has pointed out that when you take the time of measures that were in the chairman's budget last time, we do when you take the type of measur

cms, the agency that oversees medicare and medicaid and we took documentation that we ran through the omb and shows oregon say the federal government's $15 billion over the last 20 years and we can save them $20 billion in the next 10 years with her new health care reform. we asked them for several hundred million dollars a year each year for the next five years to help us make this transition and the response was extraordinarily positive. [applause] so what that means this will most likely have the resources necessary to make this transition for those dollars will not come to oregon to pop up the current delivery model. he will pull through the care organizations that will produce savings over the next 10 years. selecting early in february to authorize the full bill of the health insurance exchange and not brace expansion of the coordinated care organization gives the only chance we've got to create a health care system that's actually financially sustainable. we have an opportunity to help inform the national debate and also put us in a position to weather the economic storm that is sur

we keep hearing about, you know, inheriting deficits and all this, during the eight years of bush, the omb figures it was right at $2 trillion. this president in his budget that he has proposed, $5.3 trillion, just four years, so obviously you are talking about just a huge amount of money. i saw it in this morning's "washington post" talking about everything is growing in government accept, there is, military, and i agree with the statements of the previous speakers this is supposed to be the number-one concern defending the country. so anyway, i just would like to not press the thing that's already been talked about on risk but i would ask the question when you meet with the chairman and come up with the risk assessment what would you say that would be? >> i anticipate by the end of the month. >> okay pooler one of the command doesn't get a lot of attention as africom and we remember that was decided in the commands everyone in this room knows we have done the right thing. however i kind of look at it as the forgotten command it didn't seem to get the attention. one of the things about af

appreciate your efforts and appreciate having the former omb to get attention on it. finally, what the director to make good, congratulations leon for continuing to exceed expectations with the wendi directors. quickly on this issue of the sequester. first you said, and i was here listening to your testimony that it creates risk and that is the for under $87 billion. you also said those were acceptable risks and explain why. this must mean that there are additional risks with step two which was an additional $335 billion. how would you describe those risks and should we move forward on the sequestered as currently planned? >> they would be devastating because the cuts would be made according to the formula across the board. so it would come out of the structure and readiness and i assume compensation would be on the table as well, and would come out of every area in the defense budget and the danger is that when you do it that way, you automatically hollow out the force. because what you're doing is you are weakening every area of the defense budget by some kind of a b

i would hope that the administration would have to clear the testimony out of the omb at the office of the president i would hope the administration would provide an equally core message to its appointees and an independent agency to say if you have some special knowledge none of us have been able to uncover them bring it forward, bring it to the congress and the industry. but so far we've had press releases but not nearly the kind of certainty experts and technical experts in this field have read in the think the process that led to the testimony today is sound and solid and represents the clear thinking of this administration the product shouldn't go forward as proposed. >> thank you mr. chairman. for the great testimony there's so much information that you can just -- i really appreciate it. one of the things you said, mr. foley i want to make sure the committee understands could with the gps system their needs to be no terrestrial navigation systems at an airport so you can be flying and if you have an emergency just as you diluted to, you could create an approach to go into an air

low level of detail in that letter, we need to work with the omb lawyers to see what exactly is the case. make no mistake, i don't think anybody questions that at the account level, army and navy shipbuilding, that would have to be equal in percentage terms, and that fits the act's destructio -- description pretty well. this is a bad idea, it is bad policy, i hope that the congress will take the steps to de- trigger it. >> i see my time is expired. i'm getting the gavel. >> thank you, senator. we are trying to adhere closely to the five, because we promised the secretary and we would get him out of here by noon. senator wyden. >> i wanted to talk, mr. secretary, first about the guard and reserve. you and i have talked about this in the past. in my view, there unique expertise, particularly the ability to adapt rapidly to mission requirements, is one of the reasons we ought to be especially careful at this time of making tough actresses with respect to what happens. -- tough choices with respect to what happens with the guard and reserve. you are going to g

the other dozens of parameters. i will hand back to jeff. >> thank you. before i joined omb i spent my entire time in the private sector. one thing i found that was often helpful to boil things down to a few slides and given that the budget is small volumes and hundreds of pages, i thought that approach would work well today. i'm going to cover for topics. first, the current policy baseline. next, i will cover the key elements of deficit reduction. then an overview of our investments in the area that is central to our competitiveness and growth. finally, the bottom line of the president's budget and how it puts us on a sustainable path. first, the baseline. we believe we have a baseline that accurately reflects our current policy. in essence, this baseline is business as usual. the baseline includes the extension of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts in the estate and gift taxes. it has the permanent extension of the empty -- amt and sgr. permanent extension makes more sense than patching these year after year. it has the enforcement of the bca caps and the joint committee sequester

i was in the department of labor during the time and we would regularly receive our guidance from the omb. it was almost always a reduction from our base. we treated it seriously and said if that is the rule, we are going to stick to it. we would submit budgets that were well below the mark. when the reports came out about the unified budget, all of these other agencies got increases. we cut spending. the other thing that happened that i think is important to point out is we would submit it reduced budget, and then senator arlen specter who had a tremendous amount of cloud would add in a huge amount well at and beyond our cuts. we would cut mandatory grant programs. he would add it back in. we would cut spending for job training funds. he would add it back in. you have a lot of blame on both sides. " we have seen since president obama took office has been an exponential growth since the bush administration. host: "politico" has this story about the reelection efforts. this is one senator who was around during the spending that happened under republicans' watch. american crossroads, have y

but even the folks in the white house who design table s-6 i believe and i think we're crashing the omb would not make the claim that this doesn't have to be dealt with. they just are saying not on our watch or not this year. the big question, one of the biggest questions for the president in the year ahead is if you're re-elected, 2013, would you deal with the problems that joe has outlined. they have not answered that. they deflected. if he were to say yes, it would take away one of the republican's biggest arguments, if the president were to em brars bowles-simpson. the republicans would tell you they would have little to run on. >> this is just getting started on our very special valentine's day edition of "morning joe." >> this is nice, we've got something new here. it's usually me against the table. it's jeffrey this morning. jeffrey, i hope those numbers are right. because -- >> i hope so, too. >> we can all go to greece and hang out. >> mike allen, thanks for the best valentine's day ever. more "morning joe" progresso. it fits! fantastic! [ man ] pro-gresso they fit! okay-y... o

what you have are campaign blueprints, and i had the chief of staff, jack lou here, head of omb for the president, and i asked him about what was necessary now, and i want to you respond to what he said. >> i think that there's pretty broad agreements that the time for austerity is not for today. we need to be on a path where over the next several years we bring the deficit under control. if we were to put in owe stair tea measures right now it would take the economy in the wrong way. >> congressman ryan, do you agree with that, to protect the recovery, and don't get into the realm of austerity where we are belt tightening to the point where you see what is happening in greece where you can hurt recovery that is occurring here in the country? >> well, first of all, the white ouse's rhetoric doesn't match the substance. what chairman bernanke said to us, if you put in place the long-term plan to help the crisis it will help today. the white house is not trying to solve this problem. when you strip away the budget tricks and accounting tricks, they gave a budget that gave a net spending i