GOP Spats Endanger Debt Deal

House Speaker John Boehner is finding that it’s difficult to keep his fellow Republicans in the House unified. Policy disagreements among House GOP members make it a lot more difficult for him to achieve a deal for a bill to raise the government’s debt limit, The Hill reports.

The spats have arisen over a host of issues, such as patent reform and a possible tax holiday. The predicament’s not an easy one for Boehner, despite his consummate deal-making skills, politicos say.

“It’s a huge problem,” says University of Kansas political science professor Burdett Loomis. Boehner “has to decide how much capital he wants to invest. … He has to not alienate people, like a committee chairman, who he might really need on a debt-limit vote.”