Thomas Donlan of Barron’s offers little positive reinforcement either to Democrats or Republicans as they continue to hold fast to their respective positions in the debate that led to a partial government shutdown.

However much anyone may disagree with the most adamant Republicans, they aren’t going away, and they do represent their districts, and a significant minority of the people at large. The U.S. government was designed to protect political minorities by giving them many opportunities to gum up the works of government. Sooner or later, the president has to play in their game. If he doesn’t, nobody will ever thank him for it.

The president has to lead, or nobody will follow. It is all too possible that he could join Herbert Hoover in the national memory of presidents who were too weak to cope with a national crisis.

House Speaker John Boehner and the rock-ribbed members of his Republican caucus also say they won’t negotiate, much less cave in, until the Obamacare issue is settled in their favor. For them, this also makes perfect sense. The shutdown and the debt limit are the only sources of leverage they have. Once those issues are settled, the two sides will talk without fear, without pressure, without making concessions, and without results—until the next fiscal cliff arrives.

Which may be a mistake, or a bluff. The militant Republicans are, as Obama has been saying, a minority of one party in one house of one branch of the government. They can do nothing without the acquiescence of a majority of the House, a 60-vote majority of the Senate, and the signature of the president. They can’t get that without scaring the country and the world’s investors to death, and nobody will ever thank them for it if they do. …

… All reasonable people—and even in Washington there are some—understand that no political victory on health insurance is as important as the full faith and credit of the United States. Neither the preservation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act nor the destruction of Obamacare is anywhere near as important as the ability of the nation to borrow money. Even the direct beneficiaries of the law will be hurt more by a default.

After all, this is a country that is $16.7 trillion in debt. It must borrow about $700 billion in the next 12 months to keep doing everything it did last year. It must borrow more than $5 trillion in the next 10 years. It must borrow more than $14 trillion over the next 25 years. (None of these projections consider inflation or the possibilities of higher interest rates, slower GDP growth, longer life expectancy, and new spending programs.)

This is not a country that can afford to alienate its creditors. The markets may not know it yet, but soon we will be past caring which pols surrender.