This does no longterm entitlement reform. And when i talk to ceos across the country, they tell me that this is leading them to put projects that would create jobs on hold and think it will hurt their Small Business suppliers dramatically, so this is not a win for anyone. The only win, if you can call it that, this gives is those on the republican side who are willing to let all this harm be inflicted just so they can stand by this principle that there should not be one dime of deficit reduction that should ever come from closing loopholes or deductions. Thats just an unreasonable position. As you know, the Republican Leaders say thats not the only option. They say the administration could cushion the blow of these cuts if they wanted to. Heres Senate Republican leader Mitch Mcconnell just the other day. The president is ready to make it bite as hard as possible, all to send a simple message to the public, you want to control washington spending, america, fine, let me show you how much i can make it hurt. Why not take the kind of flexibility the republicans are offering . Because i think that as youve heard, independent economists say from the chairman of the Federal Reserve ben bernanke to the independent congressional budget office, there is no way that you can move the deck chairs around in a way that will not cost our economy, as cbo projects, 750,000 jobs. When you have those type of harsh spending cuts in such a short, concentrated period of time, its like saying to somebody, you can cut off three of your fingers, but you can have the flexibility to choose which ones you want to cut off. If youre cutting 42 billion from defense, youre going to dramatically hurt operations and maintenance and our military training. If you have to cut as much as is required on the domestic side, you could eliminate head start, the fbi and the National Science foundation, and you still would not get there. Now, you know, if they want to talk about real flexibility that would allow the president to actually reduce the deficit in a way that didnt hurt jobs and, most importantly, to be able to reduce loopholes, Corporate Tax expenditures, tax expenditures for the well off in a way that didnt hurt jobs, that would be one thing, but what theyre saying is the only way that we can do cuts are in very harsh devastating ways that would cost 750,000 jobs and that their flexibility does not include the ability to ask for one dime of revenues that lower the deficit from corporate loopholes even though, george, it was only ten weeks ago that Speaker Boehner said that we could reduce the deficit by up to 1 trillion from exactly this type of tax reform that closes loopholes and reduces tax expenditures. As you know, gene, even the president s allies have accuseds administration of hyping the pain caused by these cuts. Heres new york city mayor michael bloomberg. Theres a lot of posturing, im going to lay off my employees today unless you do something. Im going to were going to close the hospitals down. Were going to take all the prisoners from jail and put them on the streets. Spare me, i live in that world. I mean, come on. Lets get serious here. And at least twice this week the administration got caught exaggerating the impact, the president claimed the capitol janitors will get a pay cut. It was said that was premature at best. Arne duncan couldnt back up a similar claim that he made about teachers getting pink slips. So how do you respond to critics who say the administration is engaging in scare tactics . You know, first of all, those capitol janitors will not get as much overtime. Im sure they think less pay theyre taking home does hurt but i think the real issue is that this is, as the president said, a slow grind. When this sequester goes off, yes, its not going to hurt as much on day one but, again, every independent economist agrees, it is going to cost our economy 750,000 jobs just as our economy has a chance to take off. George, you could bring ceo after ceo on your show who would tell you that this type of uncertainty and dysfunction in washington is forcing them to hold back projects that they would be doing that would be creating jobs. Theyre worried its going to hurt their Small Business suppliers and as and my belief is that as this pain starts to gradually spread to communities affected by military spending, to children who need Mental Health services, to people who care about our border security, i believe that more republican colleagues who are concerned about this harm to their constituents will choose bipartisan compromise on revenue raising tax reform with serious entitlement reform. Theyll choose this bipartisan compromise over what is an ideological position that every single penny of deficit reduction Going Forward must be on the middle class or seniors or our children and that there cant be one penny that comes from closing loopholes or tax expenditures. That is not a position that the public supports. Its not the kind of bipartisan compromise we need to move our country forward. Before you go, i have to ask you about this strange sparring match you had with bob woodward of the Washington Post this week. I guess it began with an email exchange about an article he wrote in the Washington Post saying the president was moving the goalpost on the sequester and i guess you had a heated conversation and in an email you apologized for it and then went on to add this, you say as a friend, i think youll regret staking out that claim. Woodward seemed to take it as a threat. Listen. It makes me very uncomfortable to have the white house telling reporters, youre going to regret doing something that you believe in. I read all the emails. They seem pretty civil on all sides. Do you have any idea what made woodward so uncomfortable, and have you all spoken about it since and cleared this all up . You know, george, ive known bob woodward for 20 years. Weve had a very friendly and respectful relationship. I think virtually everybody who has looked at my email to him and his reply to me thought those emails reflected that degree of respect and politeness and the emails were fundamentally substantive. I was i was arguing a case as to why i believed the president asking for balance is consistent with where things have been for the last several years, so all i can say, george, is that bob woodward is a legend. I hope that him and i can put this behind us and i think, most importantly so you havent talked about it yet . You know, i havent talked to him yet but i hope to. I hope we can put it behind us because i think we both care about the policy issues we were debating and think thats where the focus of our National Debate should be, not on our email exchange. Gene sperling, thanks for your time this morning. Your time. And lets get a Republican Point of view from New Hampshire senator kelly ayotte. Thanks for joining us this morning. Senator, you heard good morning. You heard Gene Sperling say this is not a win for republicans. Do you agree with him on his assessment on how much damage these cuts are going to do . Well, george, i serve on the Armed Services committee. Ive listened to our military commanders for the last year. I also traveled around the country with senators mccain and graham, and so i am really concerned about the impact on our national security. Weve already heard on cuts on training for our active duty troops, also, flight hours for the combat fighter pilots, so, yes, theres some real concern about undermining our national security, but i want to step back for a minute because i actually think that what the woodward exchange with mr. Sperling demonstrates is that both sides are rewriting history here to some extent. You had the president out blaming republicans when the idea came from the white house and now hes trying to write into tax increases into the plan when it wasnt ever in the plan. Republicans were insisting on having some kind of on the republican end republicans were insisting right, there was thats what i say on the republican end, the enforcement mechanicism was one where we left 50 of spending off the table so that defense takes a disproportionate cut which wheres the party of Ronald Reagan on this, so i think its time mr. Sperling talked about this being a choice of increasing taxes, we just increased taxes, the congress did, in january at the president s request. How about alternative spending cuts . In fact, this week i offered a people to do that so why cant both sides Work Together to do this in a more sensible way. What other spending cuts do you think would work to achieve these same kinds of savings . I think there are many. First of all, the house obviously had a proposal they did last year, but there are a whole host of reforms. We left 50 of spending on the table, so i had some ideas on you can continue a pay freeze for federal employees. You can reform federal retirement and congress retirement. You could do things to reform some of the problems that weve had with food stamps that, in fact, are similar to what we passed in the Senate Farm Bill so not a new idea. Theres a whole host of ideas of how we could cut spending in a more responsible way that doesnt undermine our national security, and that seems to be being left out of the discussion on both sides here. You also heard Gene Sperling say he believes the pressure will build on a lot of republicans to come to the table on new revenues and one of your colleagues, senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said hes open to that. Take a listen. To me this is a bipartisan problem. This is the chance to do the big deal. Im willing to raise revenue. Im willing to raise 600 billion in new revenue if my democratic friends would be willing to reform entitlements and we can fix sequestration together. Why not go for the big deal at this point . You mentioned the president s position earlier. His position always was 2 or 3 in spending cuts for every dollar in revenue. Right now youre going at a rate of 4 in spending cuts for every dollar in new revenue. Are you prepared to sit down and talk about a much bigger deal . Well, george, what the president is now what he pushed recently in the senate this week, the 85 billion small deal with tax increases, thats not going to work. If were going to increase revenue again, its got to go to the debt with real entitlement reform and real tax reform when you actually lower rates, and i thinkg that none of that has been in this discussion, so absolutely i think we need to do a big agreement for the country because we havent dealt with the fundamental drivers of our debt, the entitlement programs and the tax reform has to be done uniformly and lower rates. So but are you willing let me just be clear here. Youre willing if tax reform goes forward and if the president is willing to talk about entitlement reform and medicare and medicaid and other entitlement programs, youre saying youre willing to have an agreement that actually raises revenue, or does it have to be revenue neutral tax reform . Im willing to say if we take the form of lowering rates so we can focus on Economic Growth and then take a portion of that and apply it to the debt with real entitlement reform but it has to go to the debt, im not going to agree to any more tax increases that are going to go to increase more government. I mean here we are. Thats what the latest proposal is from the president. This sequester has to be dealt with within existing spending and alternative cuts and we need real entitlement reform and real tax reform. Thats what we need for the country if were going to drive down our debt and also be focused on Economic Growth. That might be a little bit of an opening that can be seized on later, although it may not happen any time soon, but, senator ayotte, thank you for your time this morning. Thanks, george, appreciate it. Coming up our powerhouse but first Dennis Rodman, no on all the weeks politics but first, Dennis Rodman has spent more time with the worlds most mysterious dictator from north korea. His first interview is right here in 90 seconds. Ntrary korea. His first interview is right here in 90 seconds. Trary korea. His first interview is right here in 90 seconds. Rary korea. His first interview is right here in 90 seconds. Ary korea. His first interview is right here in 90 seconds. Ry korea. His first interview is right here in 90 seconds. Y korea. His first interview is right here in eo c o and we are back now with this weeks weirdest encounter. Top of the news in north korea, the First American to meet kim jongun, not john kerry or even jimmy carter, nope, it was Dennis Rodman, aka the worm. They watched basketball. Kim is a big fan, but that was just the beginning. Some ice skating too and an aquarium visit then a long dinner and lots of drinks with one of the worlds most mysterious and dangerous men. I love him. I love him. The guy is awesome. He was so honest. That about a dictator who presides over prison camps, allows millions to starve and has threatened to destroy the United States. Amazingly, rodman now has more firsthand impressions of kim than any other american. There is nobody at the cia who could tell you more personally about kim jongun than Dennis Rodman, and that in itself is scary. And Dennis Rodman joins us right now. I guess you dont find it scary. No, its not scary. Its amazingly wild, man. You know what, it was such a great experience. Me and my i call him my son, elton king, we went there, man, and it wasnt supposed to be like that. It was just like meet the guy and have a good time. It turned into such an event. I have to ask you, when you said you love him, were you aware of his regimes horrendous human rights record . I didnt look at all that. I understand what hes doing. I dont condone that. I hate the fact that hes doing that, but the fact is that, you know what, thats a human being, though. He let his guard down one day to me, a friend. I didnt talk about that. I understand that. I understand that. You think you have a responsibility to ask him about it so that you dont be perceived as sort of propping up his regime, his cult of personality . When you grow up in that environment, especially when your grandpa and your father now, one thing, the kid is only 28 years old. You called them great leaders. Do you really believe that . What i saw in that country, i saw in that country and i saw people respect him and his family and thats what i mean about that. Arent they forced to . Huh . Arent they forced to . I say no because i think hes because this is a different view because i sat with him for two days. One thing he asked me to give obama something to say and do one thing. He want obama to do one thing, call him. He wants a call from president obama . Thats right. He told me that. He said, if you can, dennis, i dont want to do war. I dont want to do war. He said that to me. Did you say why dont you pick up the phone and call president obama . No, you know, its a different story. Its a different story because guess what, the kid is only 28 years old, 28. Hes not his dad, not his grandpa. Hes 28 years old. So you think hes different. What did he tell you about america, and what did you learn about him . Guess what, the one thing i said to him, i said we talked about if you see the clips or whatever, he loves basketball. And i said obama loves basketball. Lets start there, all right. Start there. If you see the quotes in the papers, he says that. He says that. Both of you guys love basketball so much. So thats one tiny bit of common ground. Did you get any sense from him that he was looking to change the relationship with the United States . One thing i noticed by him, hes very humble. Hes very humble, man. As a kid hes very humble. Hes very hes very strong as a man, hes very strong but guess what, he dont want war. Thats one thing he dont want. He said in the past he would destroy the United States. Well, i just think thats coming from his father. I think as a young man, him he dont want anything what else does he know about the United States and president obama from what you could tell . I can tell by him, he does one thing, he loves he loves power. He loves control because others, you know, dad and stuff like that, but hes just a great guy. Hes just a great guy. If you sit down and talk to him, you know, perception is perceiving how things work. A great guy who puts 200,000 people in prison camps. You know, guess what, its amazing of how we do the same thing here. We have prison camps in the United States. We dont have prison camps, its about politics, right. And the one thing is, he dont want to do that. He dont want to do that, but you know what, its more like it im not a diplomat. I dont want to do that. It sounds like youre apologizing for him. No, im not apologizing for him. I think the fact that hes a good guy to me. Guess what, hes my friend. I dont condone what he does, but as far as a person to person, hes my friend. For what he does, deal with it. Someone who hypothetically is a murderer who is your friend is still a murderer. Well, you know what, seriously, you know what, guess what, guess what, what i did, what i did was history, was history, and guess what, its just like we do over here in america, right . Its amazing that we have president s over here do the same thing, right . Its amazing that bill clinton could do one thing and have sex with his secretary and really get away with it and still be powerful. How can you compare that to prison camps . No, prison camps do one thing. We dont need to do one thing, object that. We dont need to do that but we do one thing, if like as a friend to friend, its a friend to friend. Hes a friend to me and thats it. So youre going to go back. Yes, i am. Im going to go back and do one thing, find out more