Debt Ceilings and Space Shuttles

Debt crisis: Republicans scent victory
by Ewen MacAskill in Washington

Both sides express unease at the deal,but it is Democrats who have given most ground to raise debt ceiling

It was easy wandering round the corridors of Congress on Monday to spot who had won the debt standoff. In huddles with party colleagues or heading off to caucus meetings to discuss the details of the new deal or standing in front of television cameras, it was the Republicans who had all the smiles.

Democratic members of Congress looked uneasy, at times shifty and some downright angry. "If I were a Republican, this is a night to party," Emanuel Cleaver, a Democratic member of the House from Missouri, told MSNBC. Cleaver, a Methodist pastor and chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, which met to discuss its reaction to the deal, dismissed it as a "sugar-coated Satan sandwich".

Hardline Republican conservatives backed by the Tea Party movement vowed to vote against the deal. But even they did not appear to be unhappy. In return for Congress raising the country's debt ceiling, normally a routine matter, the Republicans have secured almost $3tn in spending cuts and forced the Democrats to do this without any tax rises. The Tea Party Republicans have not got all they wanted but they have got a lot of it, and sacrificed almost nothing in return. They will vote against, maintaining ideological purity, insisting the cuts could be deeper.

The decisive day in Congress after weeks of a standoff was Sunday: that is when the Republican and Democratic leaders in the House and Senate, in negotiation with Barack Obama, reached agreement on the broad outlines of a deal. Congress itself was eerily quiet. Far from being full of frantic and frenzied politicians running up and down staircases and corridors, the place was almost empty, occupied mainly by journalists, sitting at the foot of the statues of dead politicians and military leaders, waiting for the leaders to come out.

But by Monday the place was packed, and there was bustle and excitement, the staircases and corridors filled with politicians discussing the merits of the deal and the looming votes and journalists jostling for quotes. Obama opted against marching from the White House up Pennsylvania Avenue to Congress, as Jed Bartlet did in the West Wing, and instead sent vice-president Joe Biden, a Senate veteran. Biden met Democratic senators before noon before heading over to see the Democratic members of the House.

It is the House where the tension is, with the Republican leadership facing a revolt by right-wing conservatives and the Democrats dismayed about the impact of the cuts on the working class.

One of the left-leaning Democrats in the House, Raul Grijalva,from Arizona, reflected the view of many of his party colleagues that the White House had surrendered too much to the Republicans. "This deal trades people's livelihoods for the votes of a few unappeasable right-wing radicals, and I will not support it. This deal weakens the Democratic Party as badly as it weakens the country," said Grijalva, co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

"We have given much and received nothing in return. The lesson today is that Republicans can hold their breath long enough to get what they want."

What is galling for Democrats is that they hold the White House and the Senate while the Republicans hold only the House, the more junior of the two chambers, and yet is it the House that appears to be dictating events.

The House, which saw the Republicans take control in November when there was an influx of members backed by the Tea Party movement, secured a win earlier this year when it threatened to shut down the federal government and Obama gave in. And now it appears he has again. "Capitulation," summed up the mood of many left-leaning Democrats, such as Grijalva.

One of the few independents in the Senate and one of the few American politicians to describe himself as a socialist, Bernie Sanders from Vermont, vowed to vote against. Expressing worry about the impact of spending cuts on social security, Medicare, Medicaid, community health centres, education and other programmes, he said he could not support a proposal that "balances the budget on the backs of struggling Americans while not requiring one penny of sacrifice from the wealthiest people in our country".

The arithmetic in the Senate, where the Democrats have a majority, is relatively straightforward, guaranteeing easy passage of the debt bill. The House is more complicated, with the Republican and House leaders spending the early part of the day in a balancing act. The Republican House Speaker, John Boehner, had to provide the Democratic leader in the House Nancy Pelosi with his estimate of the scale of the Republican revolt. The onus was on her then to find enough Democrats to vote for the debt deal to balance out the revolting Republicans. Between them, they need to find 216 votes.

Boehner, in an attempt to win over some of the rebels on the margins, said that though the Republicans did not get everything they wanted – such as an assurance that the Pentagon will not be a major victim of the spending cuts – they had got most of it and changed the debate in Washington.

But that will not be enough to tip scores of Republicans, particularly those allied to the Tea Party, such as Michele Bachmann, the Congresswoman who is seeking the party's nomination to take on Obama for the White House next year. She has already vowed to vote against.

"Throughout this process the president has failed to lead and failed to provide a plan. The 'deal' he announced spends too much and doesn't cut enough. This isn't the deal the American people 'preferred' either, Mr President. Someone has to say no. I will," Bachmann said.

A few Tea Party supporters who had been hardline were softening. Allan West, a House member for Florida, has long been a Tea Party favourite but last week fell foul of them when he said he was prepared to vote for a compromise bill put forward by the Boehner, one that many other Tea Party-aligned members of the House rejected.

Although he has since been warned by the Tea Party he could face a primary challenge next year, he described the new deal as a good plan for the American people.

Boehner, having exhausted the policy arguments, used one final incentive to win support. He told his colleagues that if they voted on Monday they could go off on a five-week holiday immediately afterwards. That might work.