Leaders in both the House and Senate are expected to move forward with votes designed to fail in the near future. In fact – the plan of Senate Democrats to defeat the House Republican budget plan came Wednesday night – and the plan succeeded. Senators voted to reject the House budget in a 40 to 57 vote. House Republicans intend to hold a stand-alone debt ceiling vote with the purpose of killing it. Both sides hope to maximize their leverage in the bipartisan talks Vice President Joe Biden is leading. Those discussions continued Tuesday – and negotiators said progress was made. Biden even predicted the group could agree to more than a trillion dollars in deficit reduction as a down payment and discuss triggers for reaching a four-trillion dollar goal pretty quickly.

The big hiccup is in the area of revenue. Biden says revenues have to be part of the deal – while GOP leaders say tax increases or any revenue raisers that look like tax hikes cannot be part of a final agreement.