0 to be enough members to have a bipartisan roll call, a rare thing in the house, if, if -- >> and does the house want to be seen as the ones who scuttled middle class tax cuts? >> some in the house do, yes. there are a lot of house republicans who are morally opposed to tax increases, and i think some of them will not agree to any kind of compromise like this, as it essentially is a tax increase, and some democrats didn't like how the deal was constructed, either, but i don't think the overall house will let this go. i think you'll find 118 reluctant votes in the house. a lot of house members don't like the details. many democrats didn't love all the details, but they're going to -- president obama has signed on to the deal, so that's going to push a lot of democrats over the line and they'll get enough votes today to get this passed. >> all right, let's say this gets done today, lynn. vice president biden reportedly told democrats, and we saw him going on the hill, i don't know what time, 10:00, 11:00 last night, that the real work is yet to come in march, when the sequester cuts will come up again, and of course, the debt ceiling battle. how does what happened last night either pave the way for or impede the way to what happens in the spring? >> well, it sets it up. it's a kick of the can down the road. and one of the trade-offs that biden made was giving the restoring to republicans some of the leverage they lost right now. everyone knows that the big pressure to get the senate to act was that everyone's taxes was going to rise at midnight. now it's some people's, the wealthiest taxes. that was leverage. democrats won't have it again in a few weeks. that's another reason why some democrats thought biden maybe gave up too much ground. on the other hand, he put together a good deal in the senate. >> there have been complaints about the way the president negotiated, whether democrats gave up too much, but let's just all agree on one thing, perry, there's not a lot of love lost on either side and the divide is huge. so, is there anything that can be done? is there any indication that this new congress will be any different? >> no. i think some of the calculations from "washington post," only 15 members of the house of representatives, of the republicans, are in districts that president obama won. what that means is most of these house republicans are very accountable to more conservative members in their districts and not necessarily looking for bipartisanship. so, i think the next fight will be just as bloody as this one was. one thing to note in terms of looking at who won, who won and who lost, which is going on a lot in washington. republicans in the last 20 years have said we do not support raising taxes on anyone ever. so at the core fundamental here, it's hard to say president obama didn't get a victory here in that he broke a republican precedent that's been really firmly established, and that's the biggest thing as you look forward. now he's going to try to press republicans to support more tax increases. and that's a big change in how washington has been governed up to now. >> perry bacon, lynn sweet, thanks to both of you. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> okay, so the bill's moving to the house, but republican leaders haven't said exactly when it will come up for a vote. on the contrary, a statement from the four top republicans was careful to say they would allow members to review the legislation before deciding the next step. with me now, pennsylvania's democratic congressman jason altmire, who will complete his term in office this week. congressman, thanks for being with us. >> thank you for having me. happy new year. >> happy new year! well, yesterday afternoon before the senate bill was passed, you predicted the legislation that was taking shape would pass the house with a substantial majority. do you still think so? >> i do. i think it's going to get almost every democrat, maybe every democrat, and it's going to get probably half or near half of the republicans. as long as they bring the bill to pass the senate to the floor, that's really the issue. i can't imagine they would want to amend it and send it back to the senate and start the whole process over again, but they could think about doing that. absent that possibility, this is going to pass and we could have it on the president's desk as soon as tonight. >> you're a blue dog democrat, and as such, you tend to err on the side of fiscal restraint. where are the spending cuts here? that's what the republicans and more conservative democrats are asking. >> the sequester was all about spending cuts. the republicans didn't like the type of spending cuts that were in there. there was a compromise made for $24 billion in immediate spending cuts split evenly between defense and nondefense programs, but the big fight over spending cuts is going to come in the budget season, which is nearly upon us. and when that debt ceiling vote hits again, probably in february or march. so, this discussion is by no means over, but we were facing a hard deadline of midnight last night. we had to get this bill done, and we're very close to doing it. >> the president made concess n concessions to republicans, even though as you pointed out, republicans didn't have a lot of leverage. in about two months, we run out of ways, as you point out, to avoid the debt limit, and that gives republicans potentially a lot of leverage. seeing what the president got out of this deal, what do you think it portends for what happens in march? >> i don't buy the argument that the president gave away too much. i think he negotiated in good faith. it was a compromise that was made with folks who just don't have the same philosophical beliefs on either side of the table. and when you look going forward at the debt ceiling, the full faith and credit of the united states has never been compromised voluntarily. we've never done that. and the reason the full faith and credit of the united states means something is because we've never defaulted. and i just can't imagine that speaker boehner or any of the republicans would want to use that leverage in that way just to achieve political gain. >> as you look ahead, and obviously, you have a very different perspective, giving that you're moving on, what can possibly happen to change the intransigen intransigence, the bad feelings, the inability to work together that we have seen in congress? and i think it's worth pointing out, again, this has been the least popular, least effective congress since they've been keeping records. >> i think -- i could give you a long speech about the way that we elect partisans to office. most of america is in the center. they want us to work together. they want us to get along. unfortunately, due to the way we draw districts and the way primaries are held, we end up generally electing people from the more extreme of the party rather than people from the center that can work together and get along. that's always been a problem in congress. it's only gotten worse in recent years. and as far as productivity, it has to do with divided government. we're not getting along very well because of what i've described. and moving forward, that is the political dynamic. we're going to have the same situation in the new congress that we have in this congress. president obama is still president. the senate is controlled by democrats, the republicans control the house. they have to find a way to work together for the good of the country. >> well, we can only hope so. congressman jason altmire, thank you so much. good luck, sir. happy new year. >> thank you. happy new year. the party to rival all parties last night. in new york city, hundreds of thousands packing new york's times square to watch the crystal ball drop and ring in the start of 2013. and believe me, they had to want to be there. it was cold!