Oh, boy. This isn’t going to end, even when or if a deal is reached on defusing the austerity bomb; John Boehner has just declared that he’s going to hold the full faith and credit of the United States hostage every time we hit the debt limit. Nor will it be a case of holding the nation at gunpoint until it meets GOP demands; Republicans are signaling that they don’t intend to make any specific proposals, they’re just going to yell and stamp their feet until Obama soothes them somehow.
And November proved that the vast majority of Republicans in the House are in blood-red districts designed to make sure 95% keep their jobs no matter what they do. They feel perfectly justified in going right back to the monthly hostage-taking on everything they can just to wreck Obama's legacy, and they feel strongly that voters will blame Obama and punish Democrats with another 2010 style low-turnout backlash election that will give the GOP control of the Senate and set up, you guessed it, the mother of all impeachment battles.
And one thing to think about: if the next two years are, as they seem likely to be, one long Republican tantrum, the 2014 election is not going to be a normal midterm. It will instead be a referendum on GOP obstructionism, which may attract a lot more attention — and much higher turnout — than normal.
That's certainly the hope. It's going to take a hell of a lot of work on the part of the Dems to get the kind of turnout they'll need to get the House back and keep the Senate, however.
No rest for the wicked, for the wicked aren't taking the next two years off.
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