I don't really remember this specific point being made about the debt ceiling discussions so here goes....By doing a little bit of political ju-jitsu, Obama has essentially cornered the Republicans and taken away the deficit reduction argument from them....
...we know that Boehner does not have the votes in his caucus to pass anything reasonable and he will need democratic votes to pass any meaningful legislation
...By going even further that Boehner/Cantor were talking about in terms of spending cuts, Obama took that argument away from them
...Thereby leaving them in the politically untenable position of rejecting a Bif Fuc*^&% Deal on spending INCLUDING the Holy Grail - entitlements
...Obama/Dems now look more serious than the Repubs on deficit/debt/spending(3 totally separate things) reduction which is the Tea Party issue
...Repubs are left defending the Bush tax cuts(the ones that were temporary and should have expired by now)
...Repubs are now painted as a single economic issue party...protect the corporations and the rich
...He's got Warren Buffet(who has tremendous main street cred by the way) also saying similar things
...Repub punditry sees what is going on and is nervous
...Kyl/Cantor are now begging for the Biden framework that they pissed on recently
I could go on and on but it seems to me that the Jedi Master has them exactly where he wants them????
...I don't think even the repubs are so stupid as to commit economic/political hara-kiri by not raising the debt ceiling
...they don't have the votes to pass anything that works on their own in the House
...they need the democrats so they are not left holding a pile of shit
...AND they can't deliver the votes for the BFD which includes entitlements
...Getting his own base riled up and out of a stupor didn't hurt any by talking about entitlements because you think Obama is bad on this stuff....shudder to think what a Michelle or Sarah would do???
CHECKMATE in 3 moves I predict.....