Now that it appears the Republicans are folding on their debt ceiling hostage-taking, Weeper of the House John "Mr. Tangerine Man" Boehner is crying "=sob= The President won't negotiate with us!=sob="
If the right lessons are learned, that's precisely why we won't have a debt ceiling crisis after today. TNR's Noam Scheiber traces things back to the fiasco of the tea bagger/ Republican-engineered government shutdown and concludes that, by and large, because the Republican caucus is delusional rather than irrational, they were able to figure out that the public wasn't behind them, and wouldn't be behind them in a debt ceiling showdown either:
But the lesson of the shutdown is that engagement and accommodation is worse than useless—it’s counterproductive. When you’re dealing with delusional people, any gesture in their direction will only be interpreted as confirmation that their delusions are true. When Obama agreed to pare tens of billions from his 2011 spending request shortly after the GOP won control of Congress, House Republicans didn’t see it as a sign of good faith, as the White House believed they would. (David Plouffe: “The trust was increased.”) They interpreted it as an admission by the president that the public supported their radical agenda. It’s only through confrontation—doing away with negotiations and inciting voters to communicate which side they support—that you have any chance of breaking through. Going forward, that means there’s no probably difference-splitting approach to, say, getting an immigration bill through the House. If you want immigration reform, let Republicans reject the reasonable-sounding bill that passed the Senate, then force them to pay a brutal price for their unpopular position in 2016. (our emphasis)Democrats, the White House in particular, seem to have learned how to deal with potential hostage-takers. It just took them two years.
