I've been talking about how Speaker Boehner has put himself between a rock and a hard place on this debt ceiling issue.
Today, David Brooks added yet another rock on one side of that squeeze.
The struggles of the next few weeks are about what sort of party the G.O.P. is — a normal conservative party or an odd protest movement that has separated itself from normal governance, the normal rules of evidence and the ancient habits of our nation.
If the debt ceiling talks fail, independents voters will see that Democrats were willing to compromise but Republicans were not. If responsible Republicans don’t take control, independents will conclude that Republican fanaticism caused this default. They will conclude that Republicans are not fit to govern.
And they will be right.
And then there's the hard place (warning: freeper link).
America is in a ‘fish or cut bait’ frame of mind. What that means to Mr Boehner, and all other politicians for that matter, is that America is totally fed up. Republicans should remain cognizant of one thing. It was not through your efforts that you reached the majority… it was the American Patriot movement that swung the country for you. And just in case you think that you have a lock on this thing and that you are the only game in town… remember what happened in 2008 when the disgusted Conservative and Independent voters either left the party or just stayed home in disgust.
My prediction is that if Boehner agrees to lift the debt limit, his tenure will be sharply attenuated.
As BooMan said, he's got a tough choice to make.
It's probably the case that Boehner has to choose between being responsible for the country defaulting on its debts and losing his job as Speaker. That's not a painless choice, but it's an obvious one.
What will he choose?
No wonder he cries so much.
I wish I could feel hopeful about all this. I feel like there are so many Republicans who just don't care, and will let this country go down the tubes either because they think they can rebuild it into a libertarian paradise, because they think it will bring on Jesus's return, or because they think they have enough wealth to shelter them from any fallout. On top of the above groups, I feel like so many Americans are too busy, too apathetic, or too deceived by rightwing rhetoric to protest, and so they'll get away with it.
ReplyDeleteHere's my pep talk Monala...
ReplyDeleteWhat I've seen from Obama is that he's a master of knowing how to play these situations. On the Bush tax cuts - he had NO leverage and still managed to get some important things in return for extending those.
This time on the debt ceiling, he has the leverage of knowing that Boehner HAS to come up with a way to get this done. I'm confident he'll find a way to use that to make it happen.