Her decision. Later today, she will have a face to face meeting with the president. The focus has turned to john kerry. The hill will be relatively quiet today. The house and senate not in session. John boehner is back in his ohio congressional district. They did meet last night for about 50 minutes. It is friday, december 14. We are going to begin with your calls and our focus on ambassador susan rice. Her decision to take her name out of consideration. What does this tell you about washington politics . Take a look at some of the headlines this friday morning beginning with the l. A. Times. From the chicago tribune. Lets dig into the details of what is behind the decision in an editorial this morning in the the Washington Post. Here is more from the interview that aired last night. [video clip] there was one piece of what i said that turned out to be wrong. There was not a demonstration. What i said was, there were extremists who came to our facility with heavy weapons. I indicated when asked if they could be al qaeda or allocated affiliates or libyan affiliates. And then they attacked and a violent fashion. Host on the front page this morning. Lets get to your phone calls and your reaction and what this means for the president or secretary of state Hillary Clinton and her successor. On the republican line, good morning carlo. Caller thank you for taking my call. I think it is that what has happened to politics today. Susan rice made comments. She was on five Major Networks taking a story supposedly given to her from intelligence that the video has caused the attacks. We know that is incorrect. The bottom line is, people were killed. They had seven hours to get the people out of libya and we did not send help. The president said that they should come after him if they did not like what was going on. We should. People were being killed. If she had nothing to do with libya, what was she doing on the five news stations . I think they covered it up, and they need Hillary Clinton and congress to tell what happened. I think the republicans, john mccain and the others that were in conference with susan rice were confused about her stories about what was told. They need to tell the truth and stop covering and up. They pushed it on the back burner after the election. I think that is sad and scary what is happening today with the administration. The general public is not aware of what is going on. I watched cspan all of the time. I watch was coming out of the administrations mouth. I am aware and i know what is going on. I think we are in a very scary time. Host thank you for the call from ohio on the republican line. The washington examinerhas more on when this is going next. He is best liked among the two Senate Members including john mccain who also was a Party Nominee and also lost in his bid for the white house. Carol is joining us from ohio. Caller i have to disagree with the lady from ohio. They have the vilified in this poor lady. It is all political. It is all part of the republican do not let the president have any kind of good things happen. They will stop everything. I have voted republican in my history of voting. I do not think i will ever vote again until they go back to where i was a in the 1960s and 1950s. I cannot fathom why the Republican Party has changed so much. I know it is the tea party and newt gingrich. They have made the Republican Party a nonstarter for a lot of us who were moderates. I do not think there is anybody enter the Republican Party i would vote for. Host this is from the Washington Post. This morning inside the new york times, the headline that story this morning on the style of the pieces and rice. There is a photograph from her from last month where she received a round of applause. Anita is on the phone from florida. Good morning on the independent line. Caller good morning. I am very, very disappointed. I thought finally they were talking like they were going to start working together. Both the democrats and republicans. You can still tell a are just beating up on the other side. As i listen to the women who just spoke, i do not understand why we do not make the agenda what is good for america . Why do we still have to have an agenda of polarization of the two parties . They are not going to leave us and the choice except independence are going to have to come up with a third party one of these days that is moderate and has america first. Host who do you think on the Political Landscape today would be the best leader . Caller i do not know. I am a very politically savvy person. I get involved. Right now, i cannot tell you. It is too much of a polarized world. Lets see what they end up doing about the tax situation to get an idea of whether they are going to Work Together or whether they want to kill the other side and let america go down the tubes. Host from the new york post. Richard is on the phone on the republican line. Caller good morning. This lady here, she is bowling out because she is told what to do. There is no such thing as being nice. Where really irritates me is that if you are black, the first thing the democrats hauler is that it is racism. If that were the other side, if it were the republicans the would have gone crazy. It is just like with the voter i. D. Lost. We are too stupid to get an id. Id laws. I cannot handle it anymore. It is aggravating. Host thank you for the call. Gary on the twitter page you can also join us on facebook or email. Politico has the story. Rices decision preempts what was to be an intense confirmation battle. Perhaps bigticket agenda items along with it. That is a relief to some inside who wondered about preserving Political Capital for fights over the budget and immigration reform. Next is bob from new york city. Caller thank you. I can read your transparent republican leanings, but god bless you, you are entitled to them. Host i do not know how you can read that, but go ahead. Caller this is a very interesting political domino going on with susan arise. It is leading possibly to kerry or scott brown, your man in massachusetts that lost. You know, if i were president obama, i would look to play this game of chess differently. I do not know if i would look to an Joe Lieberman or somebody completely unexpected. I would keep john kerry out of it and i would play the political game of chess that is being forced imam the president. I would like to say i agree with the former callers and really the woman from florida talking about how we should not be rigid we should be making decisions about what is best for america. I would like to finish and say this deficit and debt is all about Health Care Costs. Mostly the costs are humongous. They are not micromanaging and looking at Health Care Costs and ways to bring down healthcare costs. I believe including opening up medicare to younker buyers, people that can buy and, who never use my health care costing 6,000 a fourier and i have not used it for 20 years. Host thank you for the call. This from to the new york times. Are [video clip] susan will continue to be an outstanding u. S. Ambassador to the united nations. I have not made a decision about who would be my next secretary of state. There is no doubt susan was qualified. Her interest is serving the country. She has done an outstanding job and i could not be prouder of her. She will continue to be a top member of my National Security team. Host one of the series of interviews the president did yesterday. The president praised the work done by susan rice. From the Facebook Page the announcement that susan rice will not keep her name in consideration. She was seen as the leading contender to replace secretary of state Hillary Clinton. Mike is on the phone from atlanta. Caller i want to give reference to the hypocrisy in our society. There are talking about misses rice and giving a misrepresentation. I want to remind america about mr. Pat tillman and how they gave him the congressional medal of honor and there had to be a lot more people that knew about that. It was documented with the female captured a that was not in comment combat, she was driving the supply duty. They put this up to america as if it was some kind of operation they were doing. It is a shame that we will not admit to ourselves a life was lost with our ambassador and other people theyre trying to make the world a better place. We will we do not want to see that as america. Anyone old enough to know anything about politics, when the rules were changed, and there are still those who stand guard by what they call old school, take our country back. Our country was not good at that period of time because it did not include everyone. It goes beyond color and race now. It is called inclusive. That is how president obama became president. It took a group of all individuals to put that man into office. Caller thank you for the call. I want to go back to another opinion post. He writes michael has this on our twitter page. The next call is leery from manhattan, kansas. Larry. Caller if people cannot connect the dots on this thing, in the words of harry reid, we have a bridge to sell you. This cover up was so obvious from the beginning. I think the Intelligence Committee and miss rice were used as scapegoats. If she has a beef is with the president. Just quit insulting the intelligence of us that are in the conservative movement. We are not democrats. We cannot be insulted that easily. This is a political decision made by the white house because they are in a campaign. If people want to deny it, go ahead and deny it. Do not insult my intelligence. Host two headlines we want to share with you. First the washington times. This is the headline from the Washington Post. Lines of communication remain open. A related story can be found on thehill. Com. House Republican Leaders have limited lawmakers times and washington during highwire negotiations with the white house on taxes and spending. In more than five weeks, the house has had 11 votes on 11 days. They get back to their districts less than 48 hours later. Republican lawmakers have been made scarce said a sensitive time. John boehner trying to hold a line against tax rate increases on dealing with anger over the removal of three republican freshmen. The next call is from baltimore, md. On the democrats line. Caller i just want to say this is a low point in modern american politics to besmirch her reputation and her intelligence to derail or career for something that is political. President obama should not have accepted her resignation, which is a fight he needed to have it. It is bigger than president obama. It is about the right of the executive to take a highlevel appointment that he or she chooses. She has been maligned and fairly. All she did was do what the cia told her to do. She did it faithfully. She had nothing to do with benghazi security. I think it is shameful. Host thank you for the call. Two headlines from the washington the wall street journal. Below that is a story related to what we are focusing on, that is susan rice announcing she is taking her name out of consideration. The leading candidate to replace, john kenney who is the chairman of the Foreign Relations committee. The story from inside the wall street journal. We are joined from georgia on the independent line. Caller thank you for taking my call. I think this is terrible what has happened to ambassador rise. The hypocrisy of this Congress George bush lied to us about weapons of mass destruction, tens of thousands of people have died in iraq and they have nothing to say about it. Obviously they are fiscal conservatives, george bush could not care what happened with the economy. I think it is terrible and time the partisanship needs to end at enter our country and they need to place people of in position who will do what is best for us. Host thank you for the call. Let me go back to susan rice with this editorial. You can read more inside the Washington Post online. Lucy on the phone from missouri on the republican line. Caller i do feel that this lady is a very brilliant scholar. For being such a brilliant scholar, i am surprised she was stupid enough to let herself be used by the Obama Administration. I do believe that she was a shield to keep of the front about what was going on. If any american does a little bit of research, they can see that ambassador stevens was begun running the would just heard about a recently for the administration. They were running guns from libya to syria. Anothere going to have mass because the administration is not honest with the american people. This man has been lying to us, and pour misses rice is the one who will suffer for it. If a americans will open their eyes and do a little research, they will see that when everything is said and done and the truth comes out, the orders were all coming from the white house. President obama and she was the one that was thrown under the boss, just like he has done with everybody else in his life. You are good for a little bit, and once you are not i will throw you out. Host thank you for the call. From usa today. A statement from john kerry. This is eric from decatur, georgia. Caller good morning. The lady that just spoke, i believe she is totally wrong. I think this thing is about the color of the president and the color of somebody you want appointed to a high position. These republicans cannot deal with the fact this country is moving forward. To disregard the middle class and the poor. Host let me go back to scott wilson who has a side bar story on the Washington Post. Next is an russ from connecticut on the independent line. The last call from this. Caller a couple of comments. Take the statistics out of a long career that rice had it. This is an example of the bullying on the right and how they use their power, money, and influence and power just to barge their way through and get whatever they want. I want to make a quick comment. Yesterday you had Grover Norquist talking about tax increases that lower income people would have when they had a medical deals under obamacare the stuff he spewed was unbelievable. These people might have a 100 tax increase, but the alternative was going bankrupt. That is what happens to a lot of people of in lower income situations. If they cannot get insurance, they go bankrupt. An extra 100 in taxes is far more preferable to that. Thank you for the call. The last word on our twitter page. Inside the washington times, a look at the figure becoming quite familiar, 16. 30 trillion. As part of the overall debate behind the debt. What the fiscal could potentially means for you and your taxes . We are talking with nina olson and a few minutes. And later sarah kliff. Today our focus is a huge part of the debate over entitlement programs and with the federal government is now spending. Olympia snowe announcing she is stepping down and delivering her farewell address to colleagues in the senate. Her husband is also the former governor of maine. They talked about what she is leaving behind what the recommendation is for the future. [video clip] 55 leaders converged on the city of philadelphia to draft a new government to strengthen the country. These were no shrinking violets, the had risked their lives and fortunes to establish a new nation with liberty. There were unabashedly opinionated. They disagreed and argued about a great many manners both petty and consequential. Thomas jefferson considered a virginia not part of the United States. By september of that year, 39 of the original delegates signed the most ingenious government document the world has ever known. It did not happen because 55 people who shared identical the points and gathered in a room. It happened because these visionaries determined that the gravity and the enormity of their common goals and necessitated advanced Decision Making through consensus. I worry. We are losing the art of legislating. When the history of this senate is written, we do not want it to concluded that it was here it became an antiquated practice. As i depart the senate did that i love, i urge all of my colleagues to follow the blueprint to order this institution to the highest calling of government through consensus. It is only then that the United States can ascend to the rightful aspirations of the american people. Host we want to nina olson. We wanted you to come back before the end of the year to talk about a topic encapsulating washington the fiscal cliff. What should people prepare for as they think about their taxes next year based on the uncertainty congress has not resolve the issue . Guest i think it is difficult for people to prepare for the situation. Some people think if the tax rates go up, tax rates go up that instead of waiting until the next year to receive and, if they have any control, they will accelerate their income into this year in order to be able to have the benefit of lower rates. My personal feeling is that it is very difficult to second guess what will happen right now. It is very difficult for tax payers. I do not know how they can plan for it. Host what is your job at the irs . Guest i a mandated to help taxpayers solve their problems with the irs. I have 2000 employees a run the country to help with specific cases. Then i have a group of people, myself included who advocate for systemic improvements to the tax system. Congress told me to give them a report. I make legislative changes. We are identifying what is the most serious problem for taxpayers, and that is the complexity of the tax code. That is implicated in the fiscal cliff and all the things in the news today. Host we go over the cliff and the tax cuts go away, taxes go up for middleclass americans. Is it retroactive to this year, or will it take place next year so it is 2014 when we see the big bill . Guest there are three components. What is the expiration of the tax cuts. That will be that the withholding rates will change on january 1, 2013. Now, that can be mitigated. If they saw the deal was imminent, they can