Analysis: Republican leader Boehner plays both sides to win

(Reuters) - Republican leader John Boehner played the right-wing Tea Party against Democrats to win record spending cuts in last week's budget fight, and now he'll use the victory to push for even deeper reductions.

In his first big test since the Tea Party helped him become speaker of the House of Representatives, Boehner deftly used the grass-roots movement's influence to get Democrats to accept $38 billion in spending cuts for the last six months of the 2011 fiscal year without forcing a government shutdown.


The deal left some critics demanding more and questioning his leadership, but Boehner avoided a rebellion from the Tea Party wing of his party in Congress, showed he could stand up to President Barack Obama and made clear he expects more spending cuts on the 2012 budget.

"If you understand how Washington works, John Boehner is looking very good right now," said Stephen Hess, a congressional scholar at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.

Boehner, who became speaker in January, publicly scolded Democrats during the negotiations but aides say he also sought to reason and work with them behind closed doors.

He played a smart game, negotiating in private even as he declared in front of the cameras that there was no daylight between himself and the Tea Party.

Congressional sources say he repeatedly pushed up the price of any compromise with Obama and the Democrats, and refused to agree on any final spending cut tally until the very end.

Democrats, who had earlier rejected $61 billion in proposed Republican cuts as "extreme" and "draconian," finally accepted $38 billion and there was no government shutdown, which could have threatened the fragile U.S. economic recovery and drawn voter anger, very possibly against Republicans.

Hess said Boehner's deal-making style is reminiscent of President Ronald Reagan, a Republican icon. "You talk a tough game, but know when to rake in the chips," Hess said.

TEA PARTY CALCULATIONS

The deal, set to be approved by Congress this week, followed the biggest battle on Capitol Hill since Republicans, with Tea Party help, won control of the House of Representatives and made big Senate gains in last year's elections on promises to slash spending and shrink government.

Under heavy pressure from the Tea Party throughout the negotiations, Boehner was this time able to come out as a winner by using their presence to his advantage.

The pressures will continue, however. Tea Party Patriots, one of the movement's biggest groups, has called the deal a "hollow victory" and said the cuts are woefully inadequate.

Many Tea Partiers had demanded at least $100 billion in reductions as a much-needed first step to lowering the U.S. deficit, projected to hit $1.4 trillion this year.