Yes, the Democrats are Winning

Jonathan Chait: “Republicans are looking to make a budget deal now because they want to escape the political nightmare they’ve created for themselves. They blustered into a shutdown that corrodes their party brand and cracks the door to flip the House, which ought to be otherwise impregnable in a low-turnout midterm election. They can’t figure out how to back down without winning concessions the Democrats have no incentive to give them. Then they need to lift the debt ceiling, where they’ve raised even loftier expectations, and where the Democrats are even more determined not to be held hostage. Their only way out is to fold everything into a negotiation, give the Democrats something, and hold up whatever they win as a trophy that made it all worthwhile.”

The Week: How the GOP painted itself into a corner on the shutdown