Reply #1: well, at least it's more likely that we'll avoid default,

[MBS]

and that's a good thing.
But (1), as you noted, we're not totally out of the woods yet . (A Talking Points Memo headline this morning: "Waiting to Exhale"
and (2) This is just the beginning of the fight, bot short term ( Remember, the budget for FY 2012 (which starts in October) hasn't been passed yet! So expect more s___ ahead)
and long term. We HAVE to raise revenues, and, above all, end the tax cuts for incomes over $250k! It's just plain fiscal prudence (not to mention fairness).
(3) Honestly, I'm heartbroken by the amount that Dems (and our country) had to give up to please the far right.
I'm trying to take the long view and hope that this will be politically good, or at least OK, for the Dems (see http://craigcrawford.com/2011/07/why-obama-won-debt-deal/ and http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/did-obama-capitulate--or-is-this-a-cagey-move/2011/07/31/gIQAhJXGmI_story.html?hpid=z2); if nothing else, given the makeup of Congress right now, especially the House, the Dems really are stuck --certainly, nothing is likely to change- until we can get the right-ring maniacs out of Congress in 2012. I really, really hope that people begin to see that the Republicans are the party at fault here, but, judging from the polls, it looks like that's far from a given.

But Katrina van den Heuvel pretty much captures my mood this morning.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/from-the-debt-debate-to-the-coming-hostage-revolt/2011/07/30/gIQAZrDclI_story.html. Excerpts:

In the melodrama that is consuming Washington this hot summer, featuring the spectacle of how much Tea Party Republicans will be able to extort for agreeing not to blow up the economy, the values and priorities of most Americans were early casualties. That reality will drive — no matter what the resolution this week — new, independent citizen mobilizations challenging both Republican zealotry and Democratic cravenness.
The debt-ceiling debate has lasted long enough for most Americans to start paying attention and to realize just how divorced both parties are from basic common sense. With the economy faltering and 25 million people in need of full-time work, most Americans want Washington focused on how to create jobs and get the economy going, not on slashing spending for the rising number of poor children while sheltering tax havens for millionaires.

Equally inexplicable is the president’s apparent eagerness to negotiate with a legislative faction willing to hold the entire economy hostage — and one prepared to extort concessions in backroom deals that it could not achieve in any normal legislative process. Negotiating with fiscal terrorists only encourages them. . .
. .. It is astonishing how out of touch these plans are with what people seek in these tough times. The vast majority of Americans want Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid protected, not cut. A recent Washington Post-ABC News poll found that nearly three-fourths of Americans oppose cuts in Medicare. Majorities reject raising the eligibility age for Medicare or cutting the Social Security inflation rate, two reforms President Obama has apparently embraced. For Americans, the most popular reforms to deal with the deficit are increased taxes on those making more than $250,000 (72 percent), hedge fund operators, and oil and gas companies.. . .. In the August recess, the heat legislators encounter back home won’t come from the weather alone. The Tea Party captured the populist anger in 2010, representing a small fraction of the population. In 2012, legislators in both parties may just encounter a populist uprising that represents an American majority.