Conservative Rebels Have an Agonizing Choice on the Debt Ceiling

It’s easy to promise to fix Congress. It’s a lot harder to do so. I’ve seen it firsthand.

Like many a speaker of the House before him, Kevin McCarthy is stuck between promising certain policy outcomes on the one hand and promising a fair and open process on the other.

Some of the most conservative members of the Republican conference demanded, reportedly in exchange for their votes for speaker, that McCarthy do two things simultaneously: Cut spending dramatically while opening up the political process to allow for a return to what’s known...