republican leaders promptly dismissed it calling the plan class warfare. does the president's plan have a chance? joining me is gene sperling director of the national economic council. thank you for joining me. the president announced today he'll go after the rich. the republicans say that is a form of class warfare. the president says it's math. but the reality is it is class warfare. the rich are a class and he's going after them. >> it's the opposite. the president is asking for balance, for shared sacrifice. he's asking for everybody to contribute and getting our long-term deficit down. he wants a plan that will be strong and powerful. the american jobs act. but we come to fiscal discipline, we all have to be in this together. when the president put out as a principle that those who make over a million or 10 million shouldn't be paying lower taxes than middle class teachers, firemen, construction workers, some said class warfare, but i'm a little puzzled. how can it be class warfare when you're just trying to ensure that there's greater parity between those in the middle class and those who make over 10 or 50 million? the top 400 highest 400 earners in the united states who average over $110 million paid an effective rate of 18%. that's a lot lower than a lot of people who are out there busting their chops every day trying to support a family. >> but there's a sense of, you know, stealing from the rich and all the rest of it and these people, many of them have got what they have through hard work and success and achievement. it is almost a tax, many argue, on success. how does the white house counter that argument? >> i just don't think there's anything to that. as the president said, this is a country where we want to see more millionaires. we want to see people have those opportunities, but those opportunities don't come in a vacuum. they come because generations before us have invested in our country and in our potential and our infrastructure and our intellectual property system and our education system. so those who do most well off in a sense pay it forward. they try to pay it forward so we can bring our deficit down and make sure that we can invest in the innovation and future of our country. >> if the republicans, as seems likely from their immediate reaction, just say, sorry, no chance, what then? what's plan b? >> i just want to remind that you the public overwhelmingly thinks a long-term deficit reduction plan should have a combination of spending restraint with asking the most well off and largest companies to pay a bit more -- >> but mr. sperling, as you know. >> hold it, hold it. >> but as you know, what the public think doesn't really matter when it comes to what the republicans do. so i repeat, what are you going to do if, as seems likely, the republicans say sorry, no? >> i will remind that you the speaker of the house did for a period of several weeks negotiate with this president and did express a willingness to have 800 billion in additional revenues as part of a package. there are senate republicans who are part of the gang of six who are willing to be part of a balanced plan of spending constraint and higher revenues on the most well off. so i do believe that this compromise is possible, and if there is gridlock, it is not -- the blame should not be evenly shared. it should go to those who refuse to compromise, who say my way or the highway. >> finally ron suskind's book is to be released. it apparently gives a scathing look at the obama presidency. the economic crisis began with the hiring of larry summers and timothy geithner. he said the actions of both men, and i quote, have contributed to the very financial disaster they were hired to solve. what is the white house reaction to ha? >> let me tell you what my reaction is. i've been here since day one. i want to say unequivocally the premise of ron suskind's book is dead wrong. dead wrong. what i saw firsthand was this president facing the worst financial and economic crisis since fdr had to deal with the great depression. and i saw him at times where in the most difficult issues, whether we should do stress tests for our banks, whether we should save chrysler, deal with these issues where his economic advisers were often split, providing different choices to him. and i saw the president sit in the roosevelt room for hours asking penetrating questions. then he made the difficult call. and on things like the financial rescue, on things like saving chrysler, he knew at the time they were politically difficult, but he did so because they were the right thing for our economy. and virtually everybody now looks back at those decisions and recognizes that they were the right things to do. so the notion that this president was not leading and making the tough choices all along is just dead wrong, and i say that from somebody who has been here every moment, who was here through all eight years of the clinton administration. this president has been as focused and tough and decisive in leading us and in economic team, and i think that is the real story. and anything else really does a disservice to this administration and the real record that has been established. >> the president looked pretty fired up today, mr. sperling. i mean, very quickly, has he got his gander back again? do you think he's up and running for the forthcoming election battle? >> if you're someone like me meeting with him every day, you don't feel like he's ever lost it. i mean, there are times when if you want to do what's right for your country, you have to try to strike compromises. you have to try to take the temperature down and work and try to reach the grand compromise and the grand bargain. that's part of governing, part of being responsible. but he's never lost his fundamental view that led him to run for president in the first place, which is we have an economy that has not been working for middle class families for a long time, even before this deep financial crisis. and he is here not only to help dig us out but to chart a new course where we're seeing shared prosperity again, and not the middle class feeling like they're getting left behind because our economy is serving and our government and our politics are serving the special interests and those who are most well connected. and what you saw him doing today is what he has always been doing, fighting for what's best for our economy. i think that was a balanced plan that really asked for a sacrifice and tough choices from everyone, leaving no one out. >> gene sperling, thank you very much. >> thank you. joining me now is jennifer granholm, the former governor of michigan and the author of "a governor's story." very timely title. you don't mind me saying, governor. whichever way you skin this cat, it is a form of class warfare, isn't it? president obama has today delighted his democratic base by saying, right, we're going to do robin hood taxation. we're going to whack the rich and give it to the poor. >> in effect, those who haven't been paying the beneficial rates have been subsidizing the upper class. if you're not having fair rates, you come to michigan and tell people who make $200 million a year pay a lot less in taxes as a percentage of their income, that's not fair. the question is what's fair and where is the money going? is the money going to invest in america and create jobs for people? and that's what this is all about. how do you cut where you can in order to invest where you must. >> you are the perfect person to ask this. you heard gene sperling talking about what happened in michigan in detroit with the car industry. big bold moves by the president and they seem to have paid off. why can he not replicate that on to a wider stage in america and what should he be doing? >> exactly what we should be doing across america is to have an active, strategic government that is intervening in the economy, not a big government, but to help create jobs in america. you know that our economic competitors, all of those countries out there who don't care about laissez-faire, trickle-down economics, they are actively intervening to create jobs for their citizens. the world has changed since before the turn of the century when we used to bow to the altar of trickle down. that is no longer the playing field that we are on. >> reading your book, it seemed to me one of the key things that you say is the problem is just the loss of manufacturing in america. i mean, i couldn't believe the statistic. since 2001, 42,000 factories have shut in america. that's amazing. >> one-third of all manufacturing jobs have been lost since the beginning of this decade. why? because of the type of jobs they are and the fact that other countries can lure them much more cheaply. the question is how do you keep those kind of jobs or get advanced manufacturing jobs in america? >> how complicit are american companies in allowing countries like china to take those jobs? >> this is a really important question because companies aren't going to be loyal to a particular country. they're going to be loyal to their shareholders. where can they maximize shareholder return. that's why the united states has to get real about that being the number one fiduciary responsibility of companies. we have to make a competitive playing field for them to choose to come to america. when i say that, i'm not talking about a race to the bottom where we're slashing wages and taxes, i'm talking about a partnership with business so they can choose to come here like with these other countries. a quick story about china. i was in china in march, they've done an unbelievable job of getting manufacturing jobs to come from the united states. they were boasting about how well they had done in particularly the clean energy economy. the people we were meeting with were chinese officials. one pulled me aside and said when do you think the united states is going to get a national energy policy. i don't know. we've got the tea party and the congress. this is what he did. he said take your time and was happy as could be. our passivity is their opportunity. and every single day these companies are making decisions about where to locate. so if we don't have -- i mean, we could have a jobs race to the top. we should be partnering, offering as much as we can in terms of training and intellectual capital. >> are you encouraged by ama'prdemeanor today? >> yes, i am. >> do you get a sense that he's had enough. >> he's rolling up -- come on. >> and rolling over to these republicans, he's now saying, i'm going to do what i want to do. it's about time. is he now doing this? >> it's totally great. but you know what? he had to take the steps before this time to demonstrate that he was the adult in the room. he put on the table proposals that republicans had not just supported but proposed. when you can say they're saying no just because of the person making the proposal, i.e., the president. on cnn they were having the debate, would you take ten dollars in cut for one dollar in revenue, not a single one would take it, it demonstrates how unreasonable they are. take it to the people. take it to their districts. be strong about it because the people are on his side. >> does he actually have the power? here's the key thing that people say to me. it's all very well, the president beating his chest now coming out fighting. i'm standing up to these tea party people, i'm going to stand up against the republicans, all of it. can he actually do it? can he challenge the convention of modern washington politics. >> the way you do it, one, is you take it to their district. and if they don't listen to the people that hired them, the people are hiring these politicians and they can fire them. that's what he's got to say. you hire them, you can fire them. if you think they're not representing you or acting in america's best interests, if their policies are actually facilitating the offshoring of jobs, when you think about tax cuts and smaller government, can you just -- michigan, as a state, we cut more out of government than any state in the country in this past decade. our corporate tax burden dropped faster than any other state in the country. >> you also had rising unemployment throughout that period. >> i was thinking it would work because that's what all the economists used to say. it didn't work. what did work was we were able to partner with the federal government. saving the auto industry and yes and investing in battery technology, clean energy technology and that investment allowed michigan's unemployment rate to drop six times faster than the national rate. in 2010 gallup said that michigan's job improvement was the best of all of the states in 2010. the difference was we tried all of those other things. they weren't working in this new world. the investment was what worked. >> take that thought, hold it for a moment. we'll come back after the break. we want to know how can president obama avoid losing next year in the election. because at the moment that's the way it's headed. 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[ male announcer ] progresso. 40 soups 100 calories or less. o0 who need imagine... one scooter or power chair that could improve your mobility and your life. one medicare benefit that, with private insurance, may entitle you to pay little to nothing to own it. one company that can make it all happen ... your power chair will be paid in full. the scooter store. hi i'm doug harrison. we're experts at getting you the power chair or scooter you need. i didn't pay a penny out of pocket for my power chair. with help from the scooter store, medicare and my insurance covered it all. call the scooter store for free information today. governor, president obama at the moment, we're looking at 39% approval rating, 9.1% unemployment rate. it's not looking good, is it? how is he going to pull this back for the election next year? >> election is always about a choice. everybody says that. he's going to have a specific opponent. and i look at this similarly. if you look at the laboratories of democracy, which michigan is one of them. i was in virtually the exact same thing. my re-election in 2006 when michigan had the highest unemployment rate in the nation, we were losing all of these manufacturing jobs. i was running against a wealthy, very conservative opponent. i was under water in my approval ratings and i ultimately ended up winning by the largest -- >> how did you turn things around? >> because it was all about a choice. when you ask people in the abstract, people are unhappy and psychologically they want to move from where they are. but when presented with a choice and see where they move to might put them in deeper doodoo -- the technical term, then they don't move. >> president clinton's point, at the moment, it's just president obama against angry people. >> right. >> the moment it becomes him against a definable face of the other side, then the people may be less angry to him and more about, whoa, we can't go there. if you were him, who would you most like to face next year? who would you least like to face? >> i think that he has a good case -- well, i mean, for example, governor perry, he'll have a tough time, for example in, you know, the northeast in the upper midwest. and i think he and romney both are supporting policies that are, as my daughter would say, so 20th century. that those are not the policies that will keep and create jobs in the united states. >> what if unemployment figures, despite everything the president's currently trying to do, actually go up between now and next november? >> he's got an argument against the republicans. they won't let me invest in creating jobs for american teachers and american road builders and american firefighters and the private sector. i've got tax credits that he can say that are going to reward companies for creating jobs in america. what they want to do is give broad tax cuts to corporations who can choose to take that money, it's fundible, they can move it oversea. his job plan creates jobs here rather than giving money to invest somewhere else. >> former vice president cheney mischievously that maybe hillary clinton could come along to save the democrats from defeat. >> she said the chances of that are less than zero. >> that's confirmation. it wasn't a denial. if you say less than zero. it is not a no, is it? it's a carefully phrased nondenial. everything changed. i went from minus 3 to positive -- >> this is a guy who really wants to create a fight. i think she's made it abundantly clear. you don't run against the person who appointed you. she'll be a loyal team player. i hope other democrats will be loyal team players and our democrats do need to get in line. >> talking about loyal team players, i couldn't let you go without reminding you of this glorious tweet that you personally wrote after arnold schwarzenegger -- >> what are you pulling out? >> when arnold schwarzenegger was caught with his trousers down with the nanny. you tweeted the following. another guy governor admits to cheating on his wife. maybe we should have more women governors. guys, keep your pants zipped, for pete's sake. >> and? it's another technical term. >> obviously implying that only female governors can keep their pants on. >> i'm just saying the temptations for female governors are probably not as great as for men. >> what? you don't have any good offers? >> i don't have any staffers coming and putting notes in my pocket. >> in the whole time you were governor. >> you know what the deal is, women in power are much less attractive to men than men in power are attractive to women. >> do you think so? >> i think so. >> is it because you're more terrifying? >> i think that male power and sex go together but women power, it's -- doesn't have the same ring. >> you sound almost disappointed. >> not at all. i'm happily married and grateful i don't have that issue to deal with. >> do you think obama's going to win? >> yes, i do. >> any doubts? do any democrats at the moment have a doubt? >> i wrote this book because i have been there. every day i feel like i watch this unfolding. deja vu. exactly what unfolded in our situation. i feel like if he's got the right script and the great team around him, he's going to win. >> thanks for coming on. thank you very much indeed. >> very good to be on. thank you, piers. sarah palin's least favorite human being on earth. joe mcginniss. why do we have aflac... aflac... and major medical? major medical, boyyyy! 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