“PR disaster”
Made me think: if the Party’s positions were reversed the media would frame this as a battle between a group fighting for a full extension of the cut and a group fighting for a vacation.
Seriously though, what advantage do you see in doing this again in January?
The problem isn't that the House Republicans are wrong, it's that leadership made what appears to be a fatal error on this issue and the House and Senate Republicans are not on the same page.
What appears to have happened is Boehner/McConnell and Reid struck some kind of deal which was a temporary payroll tax cut extension with no tax increase offsets and the Keystone language. McConnell took it back to his caucus and got the vast majority of Republicans to vote for it. Boehner did the same and found opposition and lacked the votes to pass it. Now Boehner is stuck. McConnell and Reid are done and their caucuses are either out of town or want to be, very few want to come back and deal with it again. The agreement was already spun as a win for Republicans because there were no tax increase offsets and the Keystone language was included. The House is reopening an issue that was perceived as done, and they just end up looking obstinate and politically clumsy. They aren't going to win now. The politics of it is working against them so badly that they will end up caving. And if they actually don't, then the resulting tax increase will be blamed on House Republicans. You gotta pick your battles and once this was mishandled it was lost. Either Boehner is making deals he doesn't have the votes for, or House Republicans backed away from the deal under pressure from constituents. Either way, it's a mess now and most likely a no win situation that will end up resulting in the House caving in.