This is not a moment, however, in which bipartisanship is valued in the way it was when Mr. Biden came up through the Senate in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.
“The agreement represents a compromise, which means not everyone gets what they want,” Mr. Biden said in a written statement issued late Saturday night as the deal was being announced.
He is banking on the assumption that Americans will appreciate mature leadership that does not gamble with the nation’s economic health.
But many on the political left are aggravated that Mr. Biden in their view gave into Mr. McCarthy’s hostage-taking strategy.
The president who said the debt ceiling was “not negotiable” ended up negotiating it after all to avoid a national default, barely even bothering with the fiction that talks over spending limits were somehow separate.