Plouffe: Boehner Saying 'My Way or the Highway'

Presidential adviser David Plouffe said Monday that House Speaker John Boehner’s response to President Barack Obama’s speech on the debt crisis was indicative of the GOP’s “my way or the highway” approach.
 

CNN host Piers Morgan asked Plouffe whether he thought Boehner was willing to answer Obama’s call to compromise on an agreement to raise the debt ceiling.

“Well, Piers, no — it’s a my way or the highway approach. That is not going to help us solve our deficit problems — and it’s certainly not going to allow us to avoid this default crisis,” Plouffe said. “So in the next few days, we need the Republicans in the House to understand, they are going to get a lot of what they want, a lot of spending cuts. Washington is now committed to reducing the deficit.

“But we can’t have a my way or the highway approach,” he said. “So if we’ll just be reasonable here and compromise — and that’s how most things in country's history have gotten done — we will be able to get through this default crisis, make a big down payment on the deficit, and then have the discussion the country needs to have over the next five or six months about balancing our budget and reducing our deficit.”

Plouffe did note that Boehner several days ago was willing to do some things that many in the GOP would have found objectionable — and the president was willing to do some things on issues like Medicare and Social Security that some Democrats had trouble with. But things seem to have changed.

“Listen, there are no off-ramps here — there are no exits — Congress has to do its job,” he said. “And so . . . over the next five, six days, maybe sooner — if sanity prevails — there will be a compromise struck that allows, again, to make sure the country understands America will pay its obligations.”