usually democrats and republicans come together and they basically agree together to extend the united states credit line this has never happened before that the united states has defaulted on the debt ceiling. that would be a cataclysmic for an economy still recovering. what s likely to happen after this fails in the senate tonight is we re likely to see democrats delink the things and contend with them in two parts they re two things one is politics as usual and the other isn t. one thing that bears repeating, we re talking about a bill that essentially pays the credit card debt we ve already incurred we re not talking about new spending to the point there, for congress, it can often seem like these fights boil down to power. republicans versus democrats but federal workers could be furloughed, millions of folks waiting to see their medicare. could include families wondering the their community college bill