Debt Ceiling Deal Reached As John Boehner Comes Out Fighti . . . Conceding!
Michael Matthew Bloomer, October 16, 2013.
October 1, 2013: “Look folks, I brew a really bad hand . . .”
Apparently, if you defied the gambler’s fallacy and bet Congress would, this time, unlike 2011, fail to raise the debt ceiling, well, you lost. No comment on how I bet . . . In any event, a gambler’s fallacy here doesn’t really apply since there are relatively few prior “coin tosses” to consider.
Nonetheless, non-tea party tea leaves suggest with near certainty (no comment on what “near certainty” means) that the Congressional Let’s Make A Deal show has, indeed, made a deal, courtesy of the U.S. Senate . . . and Ted Cruz. As always, however, the prospect of the Senate bill passing the House remains murky, as usual, although explorers embedded in the GOP report and improved mood among certain GOPers that chances have improved. According to some, Speaker Boehner has conceded to reality, after proving, he hopes, his Tea Party cred. He tried.
So now he will do his Speaker’s job and bring the Senate bill to the floor once the Senate vote is in. Such bill will (1) extend the debt ceiling until February 7, 2014; (2) reopen the government immediately and keep it so until January 15, 2014; and (3) perhaps as early as today, convene a budget conference committee. Democrats and the President hung tough and thereby, in defeating GOP efforts to defund it, breathed new life into the Affordable Care Act’s funding and future. These are Democratic “victories,” yet in a battle that ought not to have been necessary.
If John Boehner succeeds in getting a Democratic and Republican coalition to vote successfully on the Senate bill that will emerge today, he will probably hold the Speakership. If so, over the last month or so he’s gone from bad hand defeat to bad hand concession, and for Boehner, that’s a win.
October 16, 2013: “And you thought I couldn’t do it. HAH!”
