their own debt? you ve cut spending where you can, you may get a second job or a third job. that s on the revenue side. so, again, i think we have to put everything on the table. i think that s what you re going to hear from president obama. i think he s going to have a very honest conversation with the american people about the fact that everything has got to be on the table, versus what ryan wants to do which says let s go to the middle class and go to poor people and take from them and let the rich keep, you know, spending and having kind of freeloading off the rest of us. and, you know, beloved ronald reagan, he raised taxes three times because he knew that s what you have to do. doug, you get the last word here. jfk, great democrat, he cut taxes. we re talking about how much to cut in spending, not whether to cut. republican congress has already made aw[/çços?y4e difference. doug and karen, guys, thank you. i appreciate it. so what we are hearing from both sides, politi
karen, let me begin with you. where do republicans, democrats and the white house agree? let s start from a point of agreement. let s see, maybe that the sky is blue. no, seriously, i think there is agreement that this is a problem we need to tackle. that we have got to find a way to rein in our debt. the problem becomes once you start talking about how to do that. and i have to say, you know, when you listen to ryan and boehner, it is intellectually dishonest when they say that washington had only has a spending problem, not a revenue problem. i mean, it is money in, money out. and if you ve got problems with your debt, you not only have to deal on the spending side. but you have to deal on the revenue side. it is interesting because if you talk about personal financial experts, the planners will say if you re in a money crunch for yourself, as an individual, you have two options. you can either cut spending or you can raise revenue, go look for a job that pays you more
obviously the congress has to vote to raise that debt limit if we re going to exceed it, which we will, contessa, by most estimates in about a month. the problem, boehner says they re not going to vote to do that, he s not going to allow a vote on the floor unless there is a serious attempt at debt reduction. in a couple of hours we ll have two competing plans. one from republicans, one from the president, as you mentioned, a third plan emerging in the senate, a group of senators and republicans and democrats getting together. there is urgency here. the stakes couldn t be higher. economists warn it would wreak havoc with the global economy if something isn t done to raise the debt ceiling. and number two, something has to be done from a purely economic point of view to bring down the national debt,ç contessa. mike viqueira, thank you. let s bring in msnbc political analyst karen freeney, a spokesperson for the democrat national committee, doug heisman, spokesman for the republican