There were no formal negotiations over the weekend between the White House and Congressional leaders on the debt limit, as Republicans ignored President Obama's demand to deliver a plan that could solve the political feud over the federal budget.
"You need over the next 24 to 36 hours to give me some sense of what your plan is," the President said at a Friday news conference.
But Republicans pretty much ignored that call, as the urgency of the previous week seemed to slip away over the past four days.
The deadline for action on the debt limit is two weeks from tomorrow on August 2; no negotiation session was on President Obama's official schedule again for Monday.
And so, with 15 days to go, what's next?
Well, as I have said many times, the Congress is a place that needs deadlines and brinksmanship to get things done.
It may not seem like the best way to run a railroad, but that's the way the Congress operates on high stakes matters, and that's very true of the debt limit.
This week, the House and Senate may both vote on a new Republican budget plan that's called, "Cut, Cap and Balance." A House vote is set for Tuesday.
While that should be approved by the House, it won't be going anywhere in the Senate, so there will be more deadlock on that GOP debt limit solution, which would cut $111 billion in spending next year.
While Speaker Boehner is supposedly still trying to find common ground on a larger deal that saves $4 trillion over 10 years, it is a tricky proposition, as some in both parties don't like where that plan would go in terms of budget and entitlement cuts.
Again, it may well be that the markets and the credit rating agencies are the ones who will drive lawmakers to back off some of their rhetoric and reach an agreement.
We'll see if the markets turn out to be the wild card this week.
