A Whole Lot Of Face-Saving Theater

Other than the World Series, this week’s best spectator sport is watching Republicans pretend that the budget deal is all John Boehner’s doing, Paul Ryan bears no responsibility for it, and it’s the result of a process that “stinks.” Everyone gets a little something out of maintaining these fictions, and there’s just enough plausible deniability to pull it off. But it’s still an elaborate fiction that helps ease the way for the GOP’s big surrender from its crisis-threatening brinksmanship.