The two main arguments in defense of the President's new chained CPI Grand Bargain proposal seem to be that:
1) the Grand Bargain is dead on arrival, anyway, so it doesn't matter except as a way to make Republicans look extreme;
and
2) the Grand Bargain is preferable to the sequester, so Democrats are doing the right thing to accept it as the lesser of two evils.
These are funny arguments for a few reasons, not least of which is that they're mutually exclusive. If the Grand Bargain has no chance of passage, then it's not a legitimate play to present as an alternative to the sequester. If there is a chance of it passing then it's a real offer, not a gambit in eleventh dimensional chess.
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