USA Today: “President Obama has canceled a trip to Asia that was set to begin this weekend, because of the ongoing government shutdown in Washington, the White House announced late Thursday.”
USA Today: “President Obama continued to hammer House Speaker John Boehner on Thursday as no new signs of a resolution to a federal government shutdown emerged and the country teetered closer to the $16.7 trillion debt ceiling due to be reached in two weeks.”
More: “As the government shutdown enters its fourth day, Obama and White House officials will have to weigh carefully just how hard they want to push Boehner, who is under intense pressure from the most conservative lawmakers in his party to not capitulate to a president who says he will not negotiate over either a short-term continuing resolution to keep the government open or the looming debt limit. In the end, political analysts say, it is in the interest of the White House to find a way for Boehner to emerge out of the crisis with some credibility with his rank-and-file, as the alternative to the Ohio lawmaker that could emerge from the Republican caucus may be far less tolerable.”
The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent gets the thinking from administration officials why President Obama has concluded he can’t give in to the GOP demands in the budget showdown. “Obama and senior officials think that if the debt limit continues to be seen as a legitimate lever with which to extract major policy concessions, it could mar the appropriate balance of power between future presidents and Congresses. This is a defining moment, one in which it is imperative to stabilize the imbalances that continue to convulse our system, largely due to the deeply unhinged expectations of the Tea Party, and the outsized influence it continues to wield over the GOP and its leadership.”
New York Times: "Even as President Obama insists that he would be powerless to save the economy from catastrophe should Congress fail to raise the nation’s debt ceiling, some law professors say he does have options. They may be politically unattractive, unpalatable to the financial markets and subject to legal challenges, these experts say, but these choices are better than failing to live up to the nation’s financial commitments.
