Applying Clinton-era policies to today

>> heard the president. you can't get enough money in revenue unless you raise marginal rates .

>> well, and here's the deal. here's the reality. let's assume they won't go for any raising in the rates. then all the bush tax cuts are going to expire, and then we would come back in january, first thing, and pass a tax cut for everybody under 250. are the republicans going to vote no on that? of course not. so they are going to get stuck with a raising of the rates of the top 2% either in a very painful way or in a way that we can all suffer a little bit, address all three legs of the stool, entitlements, cuts, and revenues, in a way that makes sense, and does make the very wealthy go back to a tax rate , by the way, in the '90s when we were raining jobs. had a lot of prosperity. that little bit in tax rate difference, i haven't talked to people in the business community that think that's a nonstarter.

>> back in the '90s, you talk about president clinton 's deal. there was a lot of reality there that was tough. first of all, the president believes that democrats ended up losing the house because of that deal. there were no republican votes in the house for that deal. and there were significant cuts to defense spending as part of that 1993 deal that everybody only remembers as raising taxes .

>> know. but this deal is important enough that everybody ought to think it's important enough to go only over. that's what we're waiting on now, the game of chicken to put the painful stuff out there. the president has put $600 billion in cuts out there. he has said the tax increases for the top 2%. now it's time for us all maybe together to hold hands and say, let's look at some of the things we've got to do structurally to get this fiscal cliff that taken care of.

>> let me show you this report from politico, which kind of bottom lined where we are. this is what they write on friday. both sides privately acknowledge they are playing familiar roles in a largely choreographed drama whose precise end may not be known but is likely to include a sizeable tax hike on the order of $1 trillion and a pledge to come back next year to come back next year and try really hard to do entitlement and tax reform . republicans say privately they were not surprised with the initial salvo. the white house notes it has put its wish list on the table, rallied democrats to its side, pushed republicans into the position of having to counter with painful spending cut proposals. so the ball is in the republicans' court in terms of what pain america has to go through in terms of spending cuts.

>> i think that's right. the whoite house has put out something that polls well, which is taxing the wealthy. most americans don't realize that the average family in america today pays into medicare throughout their lifetime $119,000 in today's dollars. they take out over their lifetime in today's dollars $357,000. and so the president has laid nothing out there to change that dynamic.