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How poorly the whole sequester fight has gone for the white house because a general rule of thumb going back decades when there is high-profile budget fight between the president and congress in washington the president almost always wins and he is losing this thing because he overplayed his hand with exaggerating the effect of the sequester before it took effect. and then, this white house tour thing has been a debacle. martha: when you look at sort of the big picture here, doug, i think this i...

Would be no problem keeping white house open for tours, ouch, right, doug? >> martha, ouch. rich is onto something. president didnt want to compromise. didnt want to have dinner with republican senators. didnt want to grow up to capitol hill. he is doing that because the numbers in mid 40s. when president numbers start dropping as i say somebody who was in the white house it is very hard to arrest the decline. so the president and his team is really, really unnerved by what is happening. they do...

How did the meeting start? did he begin with his ideas? >> he had -- no, he had a very short opening statement, and he went right into questions. but the questions i think the people had been preselected, so i think he had a little pit of a tipoff -- little bit of a tipoff to what the questions were going to be, but it was still a good dialogue. bill: did you get a chance to ask him a question? >> i did not. i would have liked to. we had some good questions. the interesting thing always with the...

The decision about its budget and to withdraw personnel from tours. >> right. and then -- >> we had to cancel the tours. it is our job to cancel the tours. they can not cancel them. martha: boy, what a mess, right? so we do hear that president wants the tours to resume for visiting schoolchildren but it has not been finalized yet. so theyre trying to dig themselves out of this one which is something they probably dont want to be talking about you but its out there. doug schoen joins me, former p...

Then president obama back in 2010 ordered the irs to crack down on just these kind of instances of contractors getting deals when they owed back taxes. so, i mean, once again, you just shake your head. we have so many rules on the books. why is it hard to enforce rules or there? >> in part it is the fine print because the various agencies can create a waiver for contractors they want to use. so this bill will require that they have got to come to congress for the waiver instead of the department...

Government, fund base being research, move education forward. and so weve seen some progress. >> reporter: day three in a row, president obama coming to capitol hill today to meet with senate republicans and house democrats. democrats not liking so much some of the offers that he it making for a big deal and republicans want him to give up the idea of new taxes, martha. martha: boy, here we go. mike, thank you very much. bill: in meantime the 1st of april is the deadline for the senate to presen...

And some moderate democrats. martha: in colorado, one of the strictest gun measures in the country is about to become law. yesterday the democrat-controlled house there passed a rule that limits the size of ammunition magazines to 15 rounds. today the legislation moves to governor john hickenloopers desk. he is expected to sign that measure into law. bill: meantime were watching the cpac meeting this is the annual conservative political action committee. it is underway in maryland. the first maj...

We dont have a long-term plan to rein in spending, to reform medicare and medicaid. to cut defense, to basically balance our budget and reduce our debt. when people see these symbolic issues as rich was saying where the people suffer and the politicians and the political class dont, it just drives home how dysfunctional our system in washington is and, how great the need is for change. >> i think, martha, that goes to a major political miscalculation the white house has made here. it thought thr...

Working on these problems, and they say most of their systems are functioning normally. the coast guard is aware of the situation, but they dont think their help is required at the moment. boy, another not great pr for carnival. so well see how that one goes. thats what they tell me. bill: there is new reaction to president obamas meeting with house republicans, his first in nearly two years. the meeting part of a push to reach a deal on the wuj. seems both sides are still far apart on this. con...

Floor and as we begin to focus on how do we solve this problem for the american people. >> reporter: bottom line, we expect that the continuing resolution to keep the government up and running will get through at some point. everybody seems committed to doing that but the budget is where the real fight is on capitol hill, martha. martha: it works both ways, mike. democrats clearly do not like the paul ryan house republican budget proposal. so what is their approach? >> reporter: well they are sa...