Prominent Democrats ask if Boehner's leadership is secure

Why is Harry Reid smiling? Democrats are openly wondering if House Speaker John Boehner is actually leading right now. His hold on his job has been called into question in the past few days by conservatives, so Democrats are joining in.

Here's Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, on the talk he's heard around town.

"We've heard about all the infighting going on with the House leadership. I don't know how valid it is. I just got a message here that there's a battle going on between McCarthy and Ryan and the Majority Leader in the House' and Boehner."

"Boehner's having trouble finding help from his leadership as to what they're to do," Reid added.

House Democratic budget chief Chris Van Hollen piles on.

"I'm getting increasingly concerned that one of the reasons the speaker is trying to string out these discussions is he wants to wait until Jan. 3 until the elections for speaker take place," Rep. Chris Van Hollen said at a breakfast with reporters hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.

"I hope he wouldn't avoid the tough decisions simply to take us into January after his swearing in," Van Hollen added, "but I'm becoming increasingly worried that that's exactly what's going on." [...]

"The risk for the speaker, of course, if he brings to the floor of the House a bill that doesn't have a majority of Republican votes, it could mean more churning in his caucus," Van Hollen said.

Boehner is obviously getting pressure from somewhere, because his regular and public insistence that he's not budging from his anti-tax hike, starve-granny position sure isn't working with the public. That's just obvious. It would be irresponsible of prominent Democrats to not point that out, so think of it as concern trolling for the common good.