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“The truth is, there is a combination in the Republican Caucus of extreme members who were elected on tea party craziness who either don’t know or don’t understand the consequences of their action, but also members who watched all of their moderate colleagues lose in primaries in 2010. The memory is very fresh in their minds."
 

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The Fix: Why the debt limit vote isn't the second coming of TARP

A near-catastrophe strikes the country, and Congress improvises a last-minute solution that divides both parties and leaves the political bases of fuming.

Sound familiar? That’s because it happened three years ago when Congress passed the bank bailout, otherwise known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).

And now, just as then, there is plenty of talk that a ‘yes’ vote for the debt ceiling compromise will leave a member – particularly a Republican – vulnerable to a primary challenge down the road. (Webroached this idea four months ago on this blog.)

For the second-straight off year, a group of Democratic consultants formed a team to participate in the Des Moines Register’s Annual Great Bicycle Ride Across Iowa.

Team Mission Control went all out for the 39th annual seven-day, 472-mile trek from the Missouri River to the Mississippi River, with members sporting matching jerseys. Ed Peavy, the founding partner of Mission Control, a top Democratic direct-mail firm based in Connecticut, was the team leader and was joined by his Mission Control partner Maren Hesla, Anzalone Liszt partner John Anzalone and media consultant Martin Hamburger.

Peavy, Anzalone and Hamburger also rode together in 2009, when they were joined by Ann Liston of ...