Politico...
Harry Reid’s debt deal post-mortem
By John Bresnahan & Manu Raju
8/3/11 

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was so worried that no debt deal was in sight within a week of the default deadline, that he began analyzing whether President Barack Obama could raise the national debt ceiling by invoking the 14th Amendment — an unprecedented move. 

“I thought enough of [default] that I had my Rhodes scholar lawyer do me a memo on the 14th Amendment,” Reid told POLITICO during an interview in his Senate office. 

Obama, of course, was not forced to make that dramatic move as a compromise agreement was forged in the final hours. But the fears of one key negotiator show how close the standoff came to the brink of disaster. 

With the fight behind him, Reid is assessing the past few weeks for signs that the tense political climate has thawed on the Hill — and so far, it’s not looking good. 

Lawmakers broke for recess without resolving a bitter partisan fight that has caused a partial shutdown of the Federal Aviation Administration. And Reid and Republicans are divided over whether a new deficit-cutting super committee should consider new tax revenues. 

The Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, or super committee, was Reid’s idea to help break the congressional stalemate over the debt ceiling boost. The panel will include 12 lawmakers, with Reid, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) each appointing three members.The committee’s objective will be to slash $1.5 trillion over the next decade. 

But Reid is already upset that Republican leaders have declared that they will not appoint anyone to the joint committee who backs any tax hike, a virtual replay of the spending cuts vs. new tax revenues fight that consumed Washington for the past several months. 

“So what does that leave the committee to do?” Reid said. “Should Pelosi and I just not appoint and walk away?” 

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