up. martha: okay. so president obama is also saying that he wants to raise taxes on families earning more than $250,000, but that move would only generate about $85 billion a year. that is a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of u.s. debt. and that number is about what the federal government spends in just eight days. so if he gets what he wants everybody over 250,000 pays more it's going to cover eight and a half days of the government spending amount and some would say the government spending problem. art laugher joins me now. architect of reagan tphopl i raeug reagannomics. in washington they have a lot of work to do. the question is whether or not the tax issue, whether or not the president has flexibility on that. whether we go back to the 39% or whether it would be less than that. are you seeing any light in that discussion? >> if he's willing to negotiate