Obama takes 2012 mandate into ‘fiscal cliff’ battle with Boehner

>> i'm afraid there is no honeymoon, no time for a break. it's back to work and back to the brink. the president has returned to the white house facing compromise or confrontation to prevent a fiscal crisis. at the end of the year automatic spending cuts and tax increases are set to go into effect known together as the fiscal cliff. failure to resolve it could prove an act v suicide for the u.s. economy and so yesterday house speaker boehner and senate majority leader harry reid road tested some ideas for rek reconciliati reconciliation.

>> mr. president, this is your moment. we're ready to be led, not as democrats or republicans, but as americans.

>> it's better to dance than to fight. it's better to work together.

>> that all sounds pretty promising, but listen a little closer to speaker boehner 's call for compromise and then you begin to hear a familiar tune.

>> we aren't seeking to impose our will on the president. we're asking him to make good on his balanced approach. the president has called for a balanced approach to the deficit, a combination of spending cuts, increased ed revenues, but a balanced approach isn't balanced if it means higher taxes on small businesses that are the key to getting our economy moving again and keeping it moving.

>> yes, you heard it. it's that same small business melody that we've heard from mitt romney for six years. now, thankfully silenced along with the strains of kid rock 's "born free," except, of course, now the lead singer is not romney , it's john boehner . if the speaker didn't get the message of this election, what about the ever erudite commentator and fox news analyst ann coulter .

>> if mitt romney cannot win in this economy, then the tipping point has been reached. we have more takers than makers and it's over.

>> of course it might equally be said that deriding 47% of the population as feckless freeloaders may be the reason why, as you say, it's now over. let's get right to our panel. here in new york, msnbc political analyst david corn , ana marie cox , correspondent for "the guardian" and msnbc contributor jared bernsteinbernstein, senior fellow and former economist for vice president joe biden . david, we have had the makers and takers, the moochers and smoochers, the backers and the slackers, the fakers and the bakers but according to miss coulter it's the parasites who won.

>> yes. i think if the republican party wants to take her advice, which they have always been so good at and just continue to deride 47%, 48%, 49%, 50%, 51%, 52%, they can do that and not look at the changing demographics. there was a key fact that david axelrod and david plouffe and jim messina reiterated at the last campaign conference call this afternoon, which was that barack obama won 56% of the vote amongst voters who call themselves moderates. not independents, undecideds, but moderates, and they said again and again, this is based in suburban communities throughout the country, and they think that was the turning point for them. now, those people probably are not a lot of takers and moochers. and so this prescription that ann coulter has, no surprise is wrong, but the republican party has some very difficult questions to answer in the next few years and i think you and i will -- and anna marie and jared will be there to help them.

>> although they won't listen. ab na m speaker boehner says she want a balanced approach to easing the debt so long as it does not involve raising taxes on the top earners. doesn't he know only 35% support no new taxes.

>> also the statistic they should be looking at from the exit polls was the 81% who said mitt romney didn't identify with the problems of people like them. people who wanted a president that identified with their problems, working class people, people who ann coulter would call takers, want things to change. i believe those people would support a higher taxes on the very wealthy who i think are the real takers in our society.

>> yes.

>> after all. also the statistic that is messina and axelrod were laying out, i think they need to redefine a few words and one is mandate. we have a humandate. a lot of other people who weren't white men voted for barack obama and they have things they want and that includes taxes on the very wealthy.

>> the republican party doesn't recognize those people you just referred to. jared , isn't speaker boehner simply reiterating the romney tax plan that basically expands revenue with a magic formula of growth and cutting loopholes that no economist as intelligent as you would ever find believable?

>> to some extent he is, and one of the things you have to be very wary as your question suggests is any tax plan that bases its revenue projections on the magic asterisk of something called dynamic scoring or supply side growth effects, and that says you cut tax rates and you get big gdp growth rates and, of course, history has been extremely unkind. what you do get is larger budget deficits and more income inequality. but i want to say one thing. speaker boehner did offer a pin brick of light there that i at least heard, maybe i'm over parsing. he used the word increased revenues. he used the word new revenues and also didn't depend wholly on this magic asterisk of supply side effects. he talked about broadening the tax base . no specifics like romney , but romney was always talking about revenue neutrality. he would never broach the idea of new revenue, increased revenue because that violates grover norquist 's pledge. so minute there was a tiny pin brick of light there.

>> do you agree with that? i struggle to hear it?

>> i heard that, too, and i also sort of look at boehner 's history. he is a dealmaker. he's known as a dealmaker. i think he is also a realist who understands that the congress, that his congress is no longer the congress that it was and that there is a surge of people who want something more from them, from the republicans, who do not want the gridlock that they have insisted upon for the past four years. so i think boehner probably is willing to make a deal. i don't know how far he would reach.

>> you also -- boehner and the president had a deal allegedly for $800 billion in new revenue. the question when you're talking about boehner , and ann is right, can he bring along eric cantor and the tea partiers. that's always an open question .

>> i was clear when i did that book "showdown" that you were so generous to --

>> it's an excellent book.

>> that jared is right. that there was a deal, and that, indeed, if john boehner was left to his own devices and own set of golf clubs , he would have said, yes. but the moderates in his own party came to him and said, you can't sign this because eric cantor is ready to lead the tea party in rebellion with you. the real question isn't just are there the parameters for a deal. is there a deal that john boehner can make --

>> and sell to his caucus.

>> and remain speaker. you have to look at some of the republicans in the senate who signed up with the gang of six plan and whether they can now act like the grown-ups and whip those tea party kindergarteners into some shape at some point. it's a big --

>> it's a big if.

>> this was a bad election for the tea party . so there is some incentive for boehner to push back somewhat on that coalition.

>> but i still think if you look at the numbers of the house caucus, it's more tea partyish than not. anything he does, he still has to retain the support of half of his caucus.

>> it means --

>> very quickly, jared .

>> one thing i keep hearing though that goes kind of the other way from this pin brick of light, i have these debates with republicans who say you won, now tell us what you're going to giver me.

>> absolutely. brilliant. jared bernstein, david corn , anana marie cox. thank