After a week of sharp partisanship focused on President Donald Trump’s harsh comments towards four left-leaning Democratic House representatives, the substantive focus remains the efforts of Congressional leaders and the Administration to find a resolution to the fiscal cliff that could be reached as early as the first week of September. The scheduled vacation departure of the House at the end of next week adds heightened drama to Washington in the coming days.

The Treasury Department projects that under their most conservative estimates the US government would hit the debt ceiling, and default on payments, as early as September 9 or 10. Congressional Democrats led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi would like a two-year deal that raises spending ceilings for both defense and domestic spending as well as deal with the debt issue. While both sides report progress, the big uncertainty is whether or not the President will accept a deal negotiated by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. There are persistent rumors that the President’s chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, a deficit hawk, will convince Trump to walk away from a deal even if a temporary default is possible.

Separately, Congressional representatives questioned Facebook’s (FB) David Marcus, head its digital currency project, a f...

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