Independents send us a tweet, post your comments on facebook, or send us an email. We begin with some of the papers across the country today and how this latest proposal from House Republicans is playing out in the papers. Courtesy of the atlantic journalconstitution here is the denver post finally, here is of the Arizona Republic here is the Washington Post on what is inside this deal we want to get your take on this. What do you think . Ted in new york, a democratic caller. What do you think . Caller good morning. I do not think it goes far enough. I think it was greenspan that i heard last week said in a Discussion Panel that a recession as a result of going over the fiscal slope would be a small price to pay to pay back all the bills, the 16 trillion, that this country owes. So, i dont think i would like to see with all the talk that we hear from the republican side about their interest in getting down this that the set and debt, you would think that and across the board cut of 10 that forces and i believe even that taxes should go up on the 98 and that it would put us in a position to really make a huge dent in the bills that we owe. I know some very wealthy, politically active, savvy people in new york and washington, d. C. I can tell you that the wealthy in this country are fighting tooth and nail applying pressure to the political insiders do not have their taxes raised. It is a part of their in come, it is a part of what they look at it as their entitlement, and they are fighting behind the scenes to fan mail. They are so mad that obama has won and they run the risk of their taxes going back to 39. 6 . Host does president obamas proposals go far enough to pay the bills . Caller no. I do not know why they are chicken about to raise taxes and deal with entitlements. I have never served in the military. I want all the republicans to hear a democrat saying if we had to put the age for medicare to 67 and deal with entitlements by extending ages going out into the future, i am all for it. Host an independent caller, what do you think . Hostcaller you look lovely. We appreciate it. I started talking about this in july 2011. The gop he said they are in violation of their oath of office whenever they refuse to raise the debt ceiling. Then when they do it on the floor, they are in violation of u. S. Code. By dissenting that argument in public and then recommending the public and the court their views. Host this proposal by republicans does not include any thing to raise the debt ceiling. Caller i know but they are going to have to do that. Also, john boehner this proposal has 160 billion less than he offered before the election and also raises the money taken out of medicare and medicaid by 62 billion. How democrats or anybody could except that could accept that. The average folks here in america do not want to pay their fair share. They cannot argue the point that everybody has to give a little bit more to help us eliminate some of this debt and keep the country going in a positive direction. Host did you see the reaction from harry reid . Caller [laughter] host let me read a portion of that. That is what the democratic leader in the senate had to say about yesterdays counterproposal put out by House Republicans. We noted in this letter sent to the white house from the speaker also includes the signatures of paul ryan as well as eric cantor and the rest of his Leadership Team seems to be on board. Here is the chairman of the republican study committees statement. So here are the opening offers in the Washington Post. Time. There is the sidebyside in the the Washington Times this morning. A democratic caller, what do you think . Caller by listening at what is going on in our country, it should be clear to everyone that not only is our country divided, but it is divided because we have a president that is sitting there fox news and these other stations resent that fact. I served 25 years in the military and i have seen what our country has provided to people in other countries without any questions asked. We had these big budgets and things with wars in iraq and then all the sudden the president of the United States is being disrespected so bad that everyone in the free world is laughing at us. We do not even have a democracy here. Host a viewer on twitter says steve in florida, an independent caller. Caller good morning. How are you doing . Any other way be anre there will agreement. I watched tom yesterday on c span2. If any family brand their house all the way the u. S. Government ran theres, if we could not print money, we would be in a very bad way. I just think we need to get this deficit under control. Those two wars that we have not paid for need to be paid for. You know, it has to be done. If going off the fiscal cliff means that it will be done, so be it. Host other groups are weighing in on these fiscal cliff talks. Here is the New York Times in the Financial Times this morning roger altman writing today in the Financial Times. President obama will be meeting with several governors today at the white house to talk about the fiscal cliff. They will be meeting this morning around 10 00 a. M. Eastern time, and then the governors are slated to hold a News Conference at around 11 30 a. M. Eastern time. Go to our website for more details. Washington insiders tackle fiscal cliff policy solutions. The group will hold a roundtable discussion today on the importance of reform to address the nations debt and deficit spending this event takes place this morning around 8 30 a. M. Eastern time. Go to our website for all our coverage of the fiscal cliff talks. We have a web site set up so you can follow along on our special page for these fiscal cliff talks. Back to your phone calls. Good morning, doris. Caller good morning. The plan that the republicans offered, this is just the romneyryan plan that the American Voters said no to. Other than destroying our earned benefit, i do not call them entitlements because we worked hard and we earned them. There are no specifics. What loopholes will they close . Of course, they are going to punish the poor and middle class. Their plan still gives another huge tax cut to the 1 . People need to look at what happened to this country between fdr and nixon. Look at what happened with the conservative takeover from nixon until now. Host we are going to have congressman tom cole from oklahoma who last week said in a closeddoor meeting that they should agree with president obama and extend the tax cuts for middleclass americans and then fight later on for that tax cut for the wealthy. We will ask him about this latest proposal, the counterproposal from the House Republicans. J. D. On twitter says on our republican , richard from colorado springs, colorado. Caller cspan could put on actual science. I think there is a lot of magical thinking on the part of democrats here. First of all, they are assuming if they raise the taxes on this one , it will not affect the jobs and the companies that they work for. Nor would it affect the customers they have. What are the percentages of the most important job creators around . How did you identify them . They had no clue. I think the other aspect of magical thinking is that in the noise and the signal, nate silver pointed out previously a 12 rise in gdp might ake for a 2 rise in employment. In 2005, we got 3. 5 million jobs lost. It is a fantasy to believe that the president s spending is going to make employment rise more. Recently, there has been an article by a Harvard University law professor who says if you are going to do this thing, it is more important to make all the fiscal cuts them back as greece and spain know, when people do not trust your debt, weak issue too much debt. If everyone heads to the door like china and other is, our debt is really going to go up. Host should the raising of the debt ceiling be tied to these overall conversations or is that too dangerous . You talk about people shied away from your debt. Caller yes. You are going to have a Tipping Point that people are blind to. Since 1847 with popular delusions and the madness of crowds when you get a contagion in there, you do not know what is going to be. People are going to run for the door. It is just stupid. They should have done the tax cuts first and then see if they need to raise taxes. The more sound policy is to cut some savings first to even see if we have to raise taxes. Host here is the statement put out by the white house yesterday. It actually promises to lower rates for the wealthy and sticks the middle class with the bell. Bill. Susan in pennsylvania, a democratic caller. Welcome to the conversation. Caller what i am thinking is the bush tax cuts or a huge disaster. Why dont we simply ask everyone to pay back what they got in the bush tax cuts . We could give them 10 years to do it. I think we could eliminate a lot of problems by doing that. Host eric in pensacola, what do you think . Caller good morning. High and a constitutional libertarian so i am standing above this republican and democratic thing. The last caller asked about the money we owe. We earned the money. It is not the governments money and th. I never hear it from the democrats. We are not here for the governments spending. We have a right to earn our own money, to keep what we have come not to pay off the things that we share. Most of that other stuff that happens, we should be going to the states to handle it. Right now because of the potential of riots, lets stop the business welfare and then lets stop the personal welfare spending stop making people dependent. Host we will keep this conversation going by let me give you some other headlines. The Los Angeles Times this morning the wall street journal says this about the situation in syria it is the front page of the New York Times this morning, and they say this peter baker and bryan gordon write in the New York Times then, also we are doing a segment on syria taking a deeper dive into this issue on sunday here on the washington journal. Moving on to the situation in israel. Five nations some men envoys of israel. Also, some other headlines for you. The Baltimore Sun next to that, president obama suggests a revamp of the russia nuke deal. In of the wall street journal a New York Times headline much about the phone call which occurred some months ago remains shrouded in mystery. It highlights the level of his anxiety about the current crop of candidates. We are talking about the proposal by House Republicans to avoid the socalled fiscal cliff put out yesterday from the Speakers Office with signatures from the rest of the Leadership Team. Christine, a democratic caller, what do you think about it . You are on the air. Caller i have to agree with a couple of other people that called in. We have had 12 years of tax increases for the very wealthy in this country. Theit has done nothing to stimulate jobs. It has done nothing to take our economy into a better shape. It was the bush tax cuts and the wars that drove us into this huge deficit that we have now. Not the republicans entitlements for this country and then we have neglected this country and the people of this country. We could have created jobs 10 times over. You have vets that are going to be coming back here, and where are the jobs for them . We have focused so much on these wars we got quagmired into, obama has been trying to get us out of them for the last four years. All the republicans have done for the last four years is say no, no, no to any kind of and obama has tried to push through bills to cut taxes for job creators, fo. Host for Small Businesses . Caller yes, for Small Businesses. Host here is reaction from senator lindsey gramm. He says this a republican from new jersey, go ahead. Caller i am calling in reference to this fiscal cliff. At this point, all the seniors are already in trouble. They are not going to get but a little increase. Congress will automatically get a raise. Theys hould stop that. They dont need the money anymore. They have plenty. Obama is going to have his way, and thats it. Host can you hang on the line . Let me get your reaction from larry duncan on twitter who says what do you think, margaret . Caller i think that is correct. There are a lot of loopholes but they do not want to do this. They are happy because they are getting this extra money. If obama gets i dont have a charge card. I am paying off all my debt. We should pay off all large debt. How much are we paying for this debt that we go . That is a waste. Why should anyone else do it . Congress. S stick with here is the Washington Times look for our coverage on cspan2 for the senate floor proceedings. Yesterday, a headline in the Washington Times president obama sending out this tweet then, she took to twitter to respond, saying that conversation happened on twitter yesterday between the two of them. Also in other news on capitol hill, a republican congresswoman from missouri is quitting congress after her most recent reelection to come an energy ceo. The district covers all of southeast missouri. 62, at the first woman office in mike in washington,an independent caller, what are your thoughts on this . Caller you know, i have my doubts about a lot of things these days. One thing i wanted to mention is every time we have a situation where there was going to be a government shutdown, they put the fear in everybody and then at the last minute they come up with something, and now they are talking about the fiscal cliff. I guarantee you miraculously at the end of the month they are going to come up with something. They are going to finally get their act together and decide on what is they have to get done. This happens all the time, year after year. I feel that when they are talking about entitlements i am a veteran. When they Start Talking about that, it makes you feel like you are a charity case if you are getting benefits. There are many people out there i know who could have volunteered to go to iraq but they did not do that. I did. Other people with disabilities and people who have paid into Social Security, i feel this benefits should not be intruded on. As far as other things going on right now, i dont understand why they cannot get things together and they cannot compromise on certain issues. Host go ahead and finish your thought. Caller that was it. Thank you for taking my call. Host the Washington Post as this story this morning the story goes on to say inside this story in the Washington Post, it goes on to say this is a story and said the style section of the Washington Post this morning. Also in the aftermath of super storm sandy, here is the New York Post this morning below that is a story with the headline our Coverage Today will continue, a review of femas prepared this in the aftermath of hurricane sandy. That hearing will be live on 10 00 a. M. On cspan3 this morning with the fema administrator. Back to your phone calls. A democratic caller, good morning to you. Caller yes. Good morning. I just have a few things to say. The government could put a freeze on a lot of things. If they puts a freeze on these things, i would give the peopl e time to spend money. Also, they are talking about medicare. I dont understand why medicare has to be a big thing. I pay medicare every month. 100 comes out of my check for medicare. I am not understanding why medicare is such a big problem when we have paid into medicare. The government is not giving us anything. That is all i wanted to say. Host the front page of the Washington Post itss about aarp anand lobbying efforts. That is an the Washington Post today about the aarp. Here is the politico story. It says here that marco rubio does not want to be the hispanic candidate, and paul ryan does not want to be the austerity guy. Both want to run for president. Each is trying to change their own image. Our cameras will be there covering that dinner. From pennsylvania, a republican caller, what do you make of this bid put out by House Republicans yesterday . Caller i think it is bad because i am a senior and i depend on Social Security and medicare. Host continue. Caller i think it is not right because i am a senior and there are a lot of other seniors out there who depend on Social Security and medicare. Every time you hear something, it is Social Security and medicare. The seniors are numbers. We have plenty of us out here. I am a veteran of vietnam. It seems like every time something comes up, the American People have to fight, fight, fight. We are tired of fighting. It is time for the Republican Party to stop arguing with them bending the 2 of the Republican Party is not going to do me no good. What about the 98 of us, and the seniors also . Independent, an c analler caller, good morning. Caller good morning. This proposal is so ridiculous. I know people that are on medicaid spending my mother is 78 years old and she gets 16 worth of food stamps the month. That is what most people get for lunch. They start out cutting from the bottom instead of cutting from the top. If you are going to take money from somebody, first start with congress themselves because they are doing such a poor job. Start with them first. If they dont do their jobs, then say, ok, lets start cutting down when you get paid every year. Host let me put some da