Why is Obama opposing a short-term debt-ceiling extension?

And why not make this an election year issue? The public is overwhelmingly against continued increases in the debt ceiling, and another debate over this next year would provide the GOP with a second chance to demonstrate that they are the only party with a serious plan for addressing our long term fiscal imbalances. At a time when a lot more people will be paying attention given the focus on the upcoming presidential race.

Furthermore, the President is really not in a good position to take a principled stand against a shorter term deal. As I posted earlier this week, the President has already signed off on 3 increases in the debt ceiling since entering office (totaling almost $3 trillion), and the last 6 increases were enacted while Democrats held a majority in both houses of congress. Not only were all these deals passed without an insistence on tax increases, but as you can see from the table below, the average period of time between each of them was only about 8 months (source).