One the one hand, Paul Ryan is having himself a grand old time
telling us about how he's finally figured out how to get Democrats and Republicans to work together to avoid self-inflicted fiscal crises ... but then
on the other hand:
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) signaled that Republicans would not raise the debt ceiling next year without some sort of concessions from Democrats, saying lawmakers were still crafting their strategy.
“We, as a caucus, along with our Senate counterparts, are going to meet and discuss what it is we want to get out of the debt limit,” Mr. Ryan said on Fox News Sunday. “We don’t want ‘nothing’ out of the debt limit. We’re going to decide what it is we can accomplish out of this debt limit fight.”
So Ryan says Republicans want to have a debt limit ransom note, but what does he think will be on that ransom note? He doesn't know:
“We’re going to meet in our retreats … after the holidays and discuss exactly what it is we’re going to try and get for this,” Mr. Ryan said.
Whatever they demand, what they will get is the same thing that they got for the last two debt limit increases: Nothing. The only question (and it's not really a cliffhanger) is whether this is the time that they follow through on their bluff and actually force a default.
Given that Republicans seem to understand it would be a bad thing to be blamed for shutting down the entire economy, the chances of that happening are pretty close to zero.
But even if they've figured out that following through on the bluff would be a bad idea, they still don't seem to understand that even threatening an economic shutdown is bad politics. If you take Paul Ryan's word for it, it seems they are going to find out the hard way.