“They are a majority party that wants to be a minority party,” the Senate Republican aide said of the House GOP. “This is not how a majority party acts. The majority party takes the power that it has and puts it to use. And in this case, they refused to use the power they had because they would rather rail against the majority that they should be trying to deal with.”

“They showed they would rather be in the minority than have to deal with a Democratic majority in the Senate and a Democratic president.”

Now, it’s up to Senate Republicans, with no majority, to find a way out. “We’re not going to go into default,” the aide said. “I suspect something is going to pass the House and something is going to pass the Senate to fund the government and enable us to avoid default.” But it won’t be on anything like Republican terms. And the House failure will even make it more difficult for Senate Republicans to come to a deal that extends sequestration spending levels for as long as possible.