Compromise with the other side. As for what compromise should entail, 67 favor a mix of spending cuts and tax increases. Thats what they say Real Progress would look like. Keeping them honest, Real Progress is one thing. Washington progress is another. So far at least we see much more of the second than the first, and were getting late new word that any progress might be stalled. More on that shortly. First, a good example of washington progress. Republican lawmakers standing up in a limited way to a beltway power broker named grovier norquist over the 1980s era pledge he pressures them to sign promising not to raise any taxes ever. Im not obligated on the pledge. I made tennesseans aware. I was just elected. The only thing im honoring is the oath i take when i serve when im sworn in this january. Thats senator bob corker and one of the a handful up republican lawmakers repudiating the pledge. Hell join us shortly. Ill ask him to be more specific about whether thats higher tax rates, something president obama campaigned and won reelection on. Senator Lindsey Graham also breaking with norquist saying no higher tax rates but open to more tax revenue by limiting deductions. Im willing to generate revenue. Its fair to ask my party to put revenue on the table. Ilt not raise tax rates to do it and cap deductions. Another lawmaker breaking with the norquist agrees. I think everything should be on the table. Im imposed on tax increases. Imt not going to prejudge it, and we should not take ironclad positions. Late today in the situation room republican Kevin Mccarthy put a fresh spin on the talking points. If the gel oal is to raise m revenue whats the best way to do that and protect the economy . If youre able to gain more revenue by closing special loopholes and limiting them and keeping the rate down, isnt that a better outcome . Once again, talk of Tax Deductions and closing loopholes, but a big note. Raising tax rates, so a lot of talk but perhaps not much Real Movement at least for now. As for Grover Norquist, he told cnns Soledad Obrien today that although some republicans are discussing impure thoughts on television, they wont really act on them. Ive had long conversations with Lindsey Graham. He said i would raise taxes if and then he lists this incredible list of reforms and entitlements that the democrats would never give him. As i suggested to him, i said, senator, youre offering to trade a tax increase for a pink unicorn that doesnt exist. Whether he does or doesnt bet on taxes, pundits in washington seem terribly impressed that senator graham and others are even talking about going against Grover Norquist. Keeping them honest, though, outside the beltway, most people dont know Grover Norquist from grover on sesame street. Standing up to a lobbyist and even a powerful one is only washington progress, not Real Progress. First step maybe even a necessary one, but only that. So is going on sunday talk shows as both republicans and democrats are doing and talking about flexibility. Let the rates go up to 39. Let us also take a look at the deductions. Lets make sure that revenue is an integral part of deficit reduction. Yes, from my side of the table, bring entitlement reform into the conversation. So far senator durbin has limited company among some of his fellow democrats. Keeping them honest during the last budget showdown, both sides talked like this, but then they backed away. Also, as we mentioned a moment ago, there are late new signs na nobody is quite ready to cut a deal. Another round of white house talks between congressional leaders and president obama was promised but is yet to materialize. A Senate Democratic leadership aide told us that staff level meetings p are meant to lay the groundwork havent been very productive. One Senate Republican leadership aide accuses democrats of leaking details in order to portray republicans negatively. The aide notes that the talks are continuing, which ifrts can be read as some sort of progress. Whether thats Real Progress or washington progress remains to be seen. A lot to talk about starting with Tennessee Republican senator bob corker. Senator corker, thanks very much for joining us. Lets talk about Grover Norquist. No new taxes pledge. You said earlier in your career, you told cbs morning news earlier today and im quoting now, you said youre not obligated on the pledge adding the only thing that im honoring is the oath that i take when im sworn in this january. So what exactly did you mean by that . Did you suggest, did you mean that under certain circumstances youd be ready to accept an increase in tax rates for the wealthy . Well, i was just elected, as you know, reelected, and our Campaign Materials during the campaign spelled out that the only pledge i would be honoring would be the pledge of the oath of office that you make when youre sworn in. Thats what my comments meant. Look, i think republicans have shown a willingness to look at revenues as long as we have entitlement reform. Those are the two ends of the spectrum, wolf. It appears that Speaker Boehner has been shown flexibility on revenues and the president on sbimgtsmentes. The point of my oped this morning in the Washington Post, is look, its easier to make these decisions and put them behind us and start the new year with Economic Growth, having dealt with these issues, than it is to negotiate some process where we kick the can down the road and deal with this six months from now with a more limited menu and more draconian steps because we dug a deeper hole. Youre talking about capping deductions, lets say, at 30,000 or 50,000 per household. What if the democrats insist and say theyre not going to sign any deal unless theres at least some increase in the marginal rate for the wealthy, people making 250,000 a year or more. Right now they pay 35 . It was 39. 6 as you remember during the clinton administration. What if they insist it has to go up to 37 . Is that acceptable under any circumstances . Well, i think the two most important people in these negotiations and i think you would agree are Speaker Boehner and the president. Thats a negotiate that they need to have. Obviously, Speaker Boehner for a bill to pass, it has to pass the house. What ive attempted to do, wolf, is to show theres a way of getting revenues that we need to solve this problem. As long as it is accompanied with entitlement reforms, theres a way of doing that without increasing rates. If people want to draw a line in the sand and say it has to be my way or the highway, that might be problematic. Ive tried to lay out a bill, as i opedded in the Washington Post that deals with the issues and revenues that democrats want to see and candidly and i think all of us know have to be there to truly deal with this issue but does it in a way pro growth. Under any of the proposals youre making, capping deductions for richer families and richer americans, would that according to your interpretation be a violation of that Grover Norquist no new taxes pledge . I think a lot of people made the pledge 20 years ago, 25 years ago, 15 years ago. I think they realize that were in a very critical time for our country, and this issue has to be dealt with. Revenues need to be a part of the component, and entitlement reform, true entitlement reform has to be there also in order to put this in the rearview mirror. Senator, leaders of both parties have suggested that major tax reforms simply wont appear happen over the next few weeks before the new year. Instead it sounds like there could be an agreement and two steps, a down payment coming right now during the lame duck session includes revenue from closing loopholes, spending cuts. The hard stuff put off until next year. What do you think about that . Wolf, we know what the options are. This congress, the 112th congress has been through two dry runs already. No congress is more aware of what the options are. Certainly we can deal with some kind of tax reform next year, but from the standpoint of dealing with this fiscal issue now, its only a matter of political courage. Again, no other congress has spent more time on this. We can make the decisions we need to make now. I am telling you, wolf, its much easier to do that technically and write it down and pass it than it is to try to negotiate some process thats likely to fail, like the first two processes have. Were better off just going ahead and ripping the bandaid off, making the decisions we need to make and move down the road. Senator bob corker, thank you for joining us. Good luck. Thank you, sir. See you later. Lets bring in the political panel. Gloria borger is joining us and our cnn contributor ross doff fit and the former adviser, van jones, the cofounder of rebuild the dream. Gloria, even a majority of republicans in the latest poll said tax increases should be part of the fiscal cliff solution. Add that to the Election Results and the exit poll results. How much do all those numbers change the political equation for the gop right now . Its hard to say definitively, wolf. It changes the equation a little bit. Whats more interesting and what you hear from senator corker and the rest is this sort of see mantic question, not arithmetic but semantics. Its the question of when is the tax increase not really a tax increase . If you dont raise the top rate as you talked to the senator about before, but you do cap deductions for the wealthy . Does that count as a tax increase . In my book it does count as a tax increase, but would republicans then be able to say, well, we didnt raise the top rate . So i think what we see going on right now, wolf, is a lot of theatrics. You see some republicans in the senate, and i would argue that the House Republicans are the ones we really need to hear from, because theyre the most dug in on the tax question. You hear some republicans kind of saying, you know, thats a pledge that was 20 years ago, et cetera, et cetera. Bottom line, wolf, is you need to have entitlement reform and those spending cuts on the table and you need to have tax increases on the table. Then they can all hold hands and jump off the cliff together. Ross, even though the styles of republicans are using to p peddle their position right now, the substance of the position is the same as its been fosh for a long time. Maybe you disagree . I disagree. I think this is a pretty big shift, and gloria is right. Its more of a shift from the senate than from the house. Le for a long time you had republicans willing to say, look, well accept more revenue as long as its revenue that comes from growth. You do a tax reform and project that Economic Growth gives you x amount more tax revenue and so on. Thats not what bob corker and others are saying. Theyre willing to say well set the Economic Growth component aside. Just do whats called statistic scoring and look at the amount of revenue you get and accept that. That is a big shift. Corker is pretty upfront about this. It is in saying i didnt take the pledge. It would violate the apparent letter of the norquist pledge. Its a big concession. The question is is it a big enough concession given the stronger hand that the president has right now . I think what you see right now would have been the makings of a deal a year and a half ago. The question for the white house is, okay, you have republicans that conceded this much. What else will they concede . Is it a situation where the white houses goal is saying, look, this is a once in a cycle, once in a Generation Opportunity to get republicans to raise taxes. Lets see how much revenue we can extract . Van, you know in exchange for the republicans biting the bullet, they want democrats to do the same thing when it comes to entitlement spends, thet cuts and serious cuts and reforms and medicare and medicaid. Will the liberal base go along with the president if he puts that into the deal . Probably not. Part of the reason is because the democrats are in such a much more commanding position. Youre talking about medicare, medicaid, Social Security. These are programs that are popular and working. If you look at Social Security, the cbo says this program is solvent until 2038. You have a hard time convincing ordinary people theres a big emergency there. The bush tax cuts are unpopular and not working, theyre budget busters. You have a hard time getting ordinary people to understand why we should take a chain saw to middle class programs that are working, that are popular, to get republicans to do something that right now theyre going to have to do anyway. Van, what will the democrats do to bring in the republicans to convince the republicans theyre going to really cut spending . Well, i think that spending cuts are on the table right now with regard to defense. 75 of americans say defense should be cut. I think that youre not going to get a 50 50 compromise here. You get a 50 50 whether both sides are equal from the american people. The republicans are far from the american people. The democrats are right there. Super majorities say hands off medicare and Social Security and defense spending should be cut. Theres less pressure on democrats to give away the store here. Gloria, didnt the president when he tried that deal with john boehner that didnt work out, didnt he agree to significant cuts in medicare . He did. There were almost there once before. There are different stories about who moves the goalposts in that negotiation. If i were the president and i were going to van, i would say, look, this president has an opportunity right now to shape the future of american budgets. The blueprint for the American Economy and for american Spending Priorities for a decade to come in this particular deal. If i were the president , i would say, look, its not going to be perfect, but we really do have an opportunity here. I have an opportunity as president. United states to lead this country into fiscal solvency if each side gives a little bit. Let me speak up for van van, hold on a second. I want ross to wrap it up. Well, i was just going to say i disagree completely with van on the policy. I think over the long run if you look at the growth rate in medicare and the fact that every year that you dont change Social Security it gets more expensive to fix, there are deep policy reasons why sbimgentitle should be on the table. On the politics he makes a strong case, and i think the lib wall base can go back to the president and say, yes, you have an opportunity to shape the future of american fiscal policy, but why not extract every last concession you can get. I think the fact that the van jones wing the Democratic Party has some political sense on their side is what makes it hard to cut a deal along the lines were seeing right now. Everyone will lose at least in the short term if theres no deal. Taxes go up for not only wealthy but the middle class, everybody in the country will be paying more taxes and there will be very serious domestic spending cuts and very serious defense cuts if theres no deal. Van jones, ross, gloria, thanks very much. Let us know what you think. Follow us on twitter at ac 360. You want next, millions celebrated the demise of a dictator but theyre out on the streets accusing the successor of trying to become a dictator as well. Things are moving fast in egypt right now. Were going there to take you on the ride. [ male announcer ] everyone deserves the gift of all day pain relief. This season, discover aleve. All day pain relief with just two pills. You can stay in and like something. Or you can get out there and actually like something. The lexus december to remember sales event is on. This is the pursuit of perfection. He was the man of the hour, egypts first democratically elected president. Now morsi is being called aa wouldbe dictator and people are protesting. Some are getting killed. Massive crowds today at funeral of a protestor who died overnight fatally injured during demonstrations last week against morsi putting his decisions beyond judicial review. Ever since he issued it the streets looked like this when millions rose to overthrow the dictator hosni mubarak. This it time they accuse him of a naked power grab. Today he met with members of the highest judicial body and emerged saying it his edict was clarified. It remaining unclear. We have the late heest from cairo. This clarification as morsis advisers call it, it is just a clarification or is morsi faced with protests weve been seeing trying to save face while actually scaling back his decree . Reporter well, wolf, weve spoken to the president s office throughout the day, and they say their position is clear that they are not not scaling back on these decrees or making any concessions. They seem to be reshaping and refocusing their message, and mr. Morsis message now is that with these decrees, i didnt amass sweeping dictatal powers and theyre still open to review by the courts except for the decisions that do with the formation of the pour lament and the drafting of the constitution. He says this is his way of bypasting the old remnants that want to derail the democratic process. He wants to save it. That message doesnt seem to win over the protestors, a few thousand of them behind me. Its 3 15 a. M. , and the numbers are growing in anticipation of the 1 million man demonstration scheduled for tuesday. As you know, the president s office under great pressure from opposition factions and the judiciary to completely, completely reverse his decrees. Are there any signs hes actually considering doing that . Reporter the way things stand right now, they are not. We spoke to a top adviser from mr. Morsi in an exclusive interview and asked them about the possibility of concessions in mounting pressure, and heres what