See how and why Washington isn’t functioning.

Bob Woodward’s freshly reported, thirty-five-page Afterword to his country wide bestseller, The Price of Politics, provides a detailed, often verbatim account of what happened in the dramatic “fiscal cliff” face-off by the end of 2012 between Leader Obama as well as the Republicans.

Now it’s happening once again. In fall 2013, Washington faces a new round of budget and fiscal wars that could derail the American and global economies.

“We are primarily a about The Price of Politics blocking majority,” said Michael Sommers, Speaker John Boehner’s key of staff, summarizing the House Republican position.

It had been the property of no-compromise:

On health care cuts over a decade, Boehner suggested to Obama, you are $400 billion, I’m at $600 billion. “Can we split the difference here? Can we land at $500 billion?”

“Four hundred billion could it be,” Obama replied. “I just can’t see how we go any further on that.”

After making $120 billion in other concessions, Obama pleaded with Boehner, “The facts about the politics?”

“My guys simply aren’t there,” Boehner replied.

“We are $150 billion off, man. I don’t obtain it. There’s something I don’t get.”

The Price of Politics chronicles the inside story of how Chief executive Obama and the U.S. Congress tried, and failed, to revive the American economy and established it on the program to fiscal stability. Woodward pierces the secretive globe of Washington policymaking once more, using a close-up story crafted from meeting notes, documents, operating documents, and interviews with important players, including President Obama and House Loudspeaker John Boehner. Woodward lays bare the broken relationship between Leader Obama as well as the Congress.