Here We Go Again

(4) Republicans say they will increase the debt ceiling only in exchange for equivalent spending cuts.

The first two positions cannot be squared with the second two. Someone's going to have to blink.

The White House is betting that it will be Republicans. Administration officials point to warnings from former House Speaker Newt Gingrich about using the debt ceiling as a negotiating tactic. They note that McConnell shied away from repeating debt ceiling threats, and that House Speaker John Boehner, in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, described the debt ceiling as "not the ultimate leverage."

As the administration sees it, Republicans, having been forced to yield on tax rates and revenue, will capitulate again on governing-by-extortion over the debt ceiling. Republicans, in this assessment, are unprepared to shoot the hostage, and their business allies will not permit it. The other points of leverage -- a government shutdown as spending authority expires, or allowing the spending sequester to take effect after the two-month delay -- will also prove too painful and dangerous for Republicans to exploit, this argument goes. Meanwhile, confronted with the shiny bauble of tax reform and lower rates, Republicans will prove more willing to accept additional revenue.

Maybe, but this assumes a lot more rationality on the part of Republicans, particularly House Republicans, than the record supports. "When you have a party so deeply divided, with so much anger directed at one another, with constituency groups that are so hard-line, it is very difficult to see how Boehner can lead them to a place where they can get a deal done" with the president and congressional Democrats, House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer told me. "The angst is justified."

And it fails to factor in Republican skepticism that Obama will stick to his I'm-not-negotiating guns. The president peered over the edge of the fiscal cliff and retreated with far less than the bargain he sought. How much credibility does he have with blustering over the far more dangerous situation of the national credit rating?

"I've seen this guy in action and he's not going to let it happen," one senior congressional aide told me. "He will blink." Here's the scary part: This scornful assessment comes from a Democrat.

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Ruth Marcus' email address is ruthmarcus@washpost.com.