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What is fundamentally different about 1995 and 2013, and i remember because i was in this room covering it as a reporter, is that the republicans then, whether you agreed with or didn't agree with their strategy and whether or not it ended up hurting them politically, you know, had a coherence what they were arguing. they wanted to force the president, then bill clinton, to reduce spending more. so what they were arguing about went to the heart of what funding the government is about, budget priorities. what we see now is republicans, they have abandoned their insistence that we deal with our ...

Remember because i was in this room covering it as a reporter, is that the republicans then, whether you agreed with or didn't agree with their strategy and whether or not it ended up hurting them politically, you know, had a coherence what they were arguing. they wanted to force the president, then bill clinton, to reduce spending more. so what they were arguing about went to the heart of what funding the government is about, budget priorities. what we see now is republicans, they have abandoned their insistence that we deal with our budget issues. when the president put on the table a budget...

And try and keep things functioning. >> just quickly, i've got to ask you, congressman cole was on "morning joe" and says it's appropriate that the speaker is advocating to go to congress. both sides should sit down and negotiate. is that still dead on arrival in your opinion? >> it's not dead on arrival to try to negotiate on the budget. i want to emphasize we've been trying to do. what is dead on arrival is this idea which republican senators have said was the dumbest idea ever, they are going to use the conference committee to threaten to shut down the government if they don't shut down asp...

>> right. in the meantime, there is also a massive national health reform bill that's going to be implemented tomorrow. >> yes. >> it seems like what we are all watching is the house republican caucus. they are the ones who have to make the decision about what to do here. >> right. >> does the white house have any leverage whatsoever with any republicans in the house? the president obviously started off his time in office with overt and high-profile efforts to have good bipartisan elevationships. republicans seem to have rebuffed him in that way. does he call republicans in congress? is he lob...

He said no. he refused to appoint anybody to negotiate on the budget. we had votes calling upon the house. calling upon the speaker to appoint budget negotiators. they voted no. they voted to deny the house an opportunity to appoint budget conferrees. what happened in the senate? i believe at least 15 times, 18 times. 18 times. the majority leader harry reid and the budget chairman patty murray asked to appoint conferrees to work out budget issues and 18 time, republicans led by people like senator lee said no. they blocked them. i would point out that senator mccain at the time said it was, q...