cannot install gcc

[John R. Sowden]

I am trying to install pure basic.  It give me a program that confirms 
what programs it needs.  It found that gcc is not installed.  This is 
the error that I got upon running sudo apt-get install gcc:


Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
  gcc : Depends: gcc-4.8 (>= 4.8.1-4~) but it is not going to be installed
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

Now what?