mr. avlon, you are first. the company is facing its first default. republicans know this could be catastrophic, but they're still refusing to blink. do they care what this could do to the country, or do you think is all about making democrats look bad? >> well, as mitch mcconnell said in the previous debt ceiling and crisis, this is a hostage they're willing to ransom. but that of course is a very dangerous game by its nature. here we are tricycling towards a fiscal cliff yet again. default would be disastrous not just to our economy, but the world economy because we're the world's reserve currency. we're the only major industrialized nation in the world that does this to ourselves. this is a self-inflicted crisis. we need to get rid of the debt ceiling. we've raised the debt ceiling 31 times under republican presidents since 1980. mitch mcconnell has voted for debt ceiling increases dramatically under the debt. this is designed to pay for things the republican congress already allocated under president trump.