From TPM Reader CB …
Polls show that Americans are equally divided on whether a clean bill should happen or whether there should be spending cuts. Josh in his Editor’s Blog piece “Let’s Call It” rightly points out that democracies can’t succeed if they are held hostage. But the average voter is who counts, not those of us who actually understand political theory and its practice. If one side or the other gets blamed for the consequences of not raising the debt limit, there will be hardcore reverberations for the next election.
Biden is mostly incompetent and should have retired 20 years ago. I have never voted for him and never will (especially with Harris on the ticket). BUT he is good at one thing- being a blowing in the wind politician. He can read the tea leaves. He knows that if he is willing to do some of the budget negotiating that he will have to do anyway, up front over the debt limit, instead of during the budget process, he puts the full onus on the Republicans who are trying to get very unpopular things that they couldn’t get through the normal democratic/ budgetary process.
This is Biden’s brand of political jiu jitsu. If Biden wasn’t willing to make budgetary concessions the Republicans would be able to simply blame him. Now they can’t. McCarthy and Co’s whole strategy was to blame Biden for not negotiating. But now Biden has taken that away and all that is left is a debate over unpopular Republican policies.
