What’s John Boehner’s endgame?

[ProSense]

What’s John Boehner’s endgame?

By Jonathan Bernstein

It’s time for John Boehner to start thinking about how to declare victory in the budget wars and get his fellow Republicans to go along with it.

The truth is that House Republicans are very close to a substantive win in the FY 2011 budget fight, and almost certainly can get one — if they’re willing to take Yes for an answer. After all, by all accounts Democrats are willing to go along with around $30 billion in spending cuts over the remainder of the fiscal year. As it happens, that matches the original opening bid that Boehner first floated, before the Tea Party pushed him to pursue far deeper cuts. Dems are even apparently willing to try to accommodate some GOP concerns on policy riders.

The problem is that this would be a “win” only by the standards of incrementalism -- a disappointing, barely-worth-passing, sell-out of a compromise. And that’s a problem, because to Tea Partyers, incrementalism and compromise sounds a lot like Washington business-as-usual.

Here’s the thing: at the end of the day, there’s going to have to be an agreement that wins the votes of at least a large number of Senate Democrats and the signature of Barack Obama. But no matter how good a deal it might be on the substance for conservatives, many Tea Partiers are going to believe that they’ve been sold out. Why? Because Barack Obama is going to sign the deal, and that alone will constitute proof of a sellout in the eyes of the Tea Party.

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Boehner is between a rock and a hard place. The dollar amount of the cut is what everyone is focused on, but the reality is that not all cuts are equal. The administration had outlined a number of cuts, and Democrats have been dealing from that position throughout the negotiations. While Republicans were posturing with the dollar amount, it was never about that with them. They were more interested in what gets cut, and that's the source of Boehner's problem. Democrats can come up with the dollar amount, but Boehner needs to deliver for the teabaggers.

Three months into this Congress and it appears the only thing House Republicans are prepared to deliver is a government shutdown, not a budget and not jobs.

[and-justice-for-all]

1. Probably crying...nt

[louis-t]

2. This is like trying to bail water out of the Titanic

with a thimble. They're arguing over $30 billion when the deficit is $1.5 trillion? Idiots.

[ProSense]

4. "They're arguing over $30 billion when the deficit is $1.5 trillion? "

When Republicans are targeting every social program and control the House, it matters.

[louis-t]

7. Of course it matters. It also shows that repugs aren't interested in

"balancing the budget". They are only concerned with their ideology.

[FSogol]

3. Drink gin and play golf on junkets all paid for by Special Interest Groups?

:shrug:

[Keith Bee]

5. He longs to be a white man

Right now, children scream and run at the sight of his autumn-leaf face.

[lunatica]

6. If the government stops all those pesky entitlements go away

Welfare, Social Security recipients, all government handouts end. In one feel swoop they get rid of all their problems. The corporations win and the Senior Citizens, the handicapped, all those people on the Government's dole get to fend for themselves. A GOP wet dream.

Who needs to agree to a budget if you can win without one?