Obama laid the blame on the “extreme wing” of the GOP. “I cannot remember a time when one faction of one party promises economic chaos if it can’t get 100 percent of what it wants,” the president said. “After all that we’ve been through these past five years … are some of these folks really so beholden to one extreme wing of their party that they’re willing to tank the entire economy?”

Many Republicans will roll their eyes; they’ve heard the president’s rhetoric many times before. But it worked in 2012, and with jobs and the economy still by far the nation’s number one issue, Obama intends to press those themes hard through 2014. “This was a speech designed to create a clear narrative that is going to last for a while,” says the GOP strategist. “He’s saying, ‘If it hadn’t been for me, we wouldn’t have turned the economy around, and the Republicans have been trying to blow it up.'”

Meanwhile, as Obama lays the groundwork for the coming campaign, Republicans are fighting among themselves over an impossible quest to defund Obamacare. After that is resolved, they will fight among themselves over the circumstances of increasing the nation’s debt limit. And then they’ll fight among themselves over something else.