The Republicans are trying hard to make it look like they're the ones driving the Fiscal Cliff negotiations, but Wall Street isn't buying it.
No matter how many times House Speaker John Boehner says the Democrats' opening offer is ridiculous, for example, the more clued-in pundits (Politico's Ben White, for example) and investors stick to their guns:
The Democrats have won. Taxes on the highest earning Americans are going up.
Given the reality of the situation, in fact, the only real question for Republicans is this:
Seriously? You're going to block a tax cut?
Because if the Republicans really do refuse to come to the table in the next month, that's exactly what they will be doing.
On January 1, by law, tax rates are going to go up and government spending is going to get cut.
The Republicans can't stop that from happening by being obstructionist. They can only stop it by compromising.
The Obama Administration's proposal cuts taxes for all but the highest earning Americans.
If the Republicans "just say no" to that proposal, they will be rejecting a tax cut.
Given that the main economic plank of the Republican party is still cutting taxes, there's no way they're going to do that.
So you can go ahead and tune out the many media appearances of John Boehner, et al. This one's over. There's no way the Republicans are going to block a tax cut.
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