John Boehner seems to have remarkably little understanding of why he finds himself “locked in an epic battle,” as he framed it during a meeting with House Republicans yesterday a.m.
… The speaker offered no clue as to how he expected Congress to get out of the dead end it has found itself in, with the government shut for a fourth day and no clear path to raise the federal debt limit to avoid the nation’s first default. “We are locked in an epic battle,” the speaker told his rank and file, those who attended the meeting said, urging them to “hang tough.”...NYT
For those of outside of the meeting, breathing real air, it’s clear that the key to unlock the door Boehner says he’s stuck behind is in Boehner’s own hand. There’s something eerie about listening a guy pounding on a door, wanting freedom, when he has the key to the door and we don’t. Of course, he has plenty to hide. For instance, as the Times reports, he doesn’t really want us to know that he hasn’t a clue how to get out of the trouble he dragged himself and the rest of us into.
… He and his leadership team have no real idea how to resolve the fiscal showdown.
They are only trying to survive another day, Republican strategists say, hoping to maintain unity as long as possible so that when the Republican position collapses, they can capitulate on two issues at once — financing the government and raising the debt ceiling — and head off any internal party backlash. Republican lawmakers say Mr. Boehner has assured them privately that he will not permit a default. …NYT
Boehner no longer seems capable of behaving like the responsible leader he was.
That John Boehner has faded, carried away by the Tea Party current that swept him to power and is now pulling him from the moorings of his past. His troops are badly fractured, with conservatives advocating one strategy and a growing band of pragmatists demanding the opposite. ...NYT
During this endgame, everyone around him seems to understand he has lost control and that, in the end, the person in control of the House of Representatives is freshman Senator Ted Cruz, the canny, crazed radical from Texas who has already given us ample evidence that personal ambitions, not “the good of America,” lie behind the Senator’s meddling in the leadership of the People’s House.