Today was supposed to be the final day of the Congressional session, as the House would return to finish off the payroll tax deal negotiated and passed through the Senate. But that blew up over the weekend. We now have a regular business day in the House, with votes in the afternoon. But it’s not clear exactly what they’ll do with the Senate’s payroll tax deal.

Well, for one thing, reports are that the exact nature of the vote the House will take today—and possibly others they’ll take today and/or tomorrow—has not yet been determined. But one possibility is that they’ll vote on a motion to concur, just to reject it. Another would be to concur in the amendment with an amendment of their own, which might well be to change it right back to the way it was before the Senate got it the first time.

Another option would be voting on a motion to disagree with the Senate’s amendment and request a conference. But the Senate apparently has no plans to return prior to January 23rd, so anything that puts the House in disagreement with the Senate amendment essentially means that all the programs extended by the bill (payroll tax cuts, unemployment insurance, the “doc fix,” etc.) will expire at year’s end, and nearly a month will pass before the Senate returns to even consider what the House may try to cook up this week. Essentially it’s a big game of chicken. Again. And all the stuff that used to make Democrats blink—like being accused of “defunding the troops,” or getting blamed for a government shutdown or a tax increase—doesn’t now and never has really meant anything to the Republicans who used to do the accusing.

Mitch McConnell is backing up his House counterparts for the time being. In a statement, McConnell spokesman Don Stewart said “The House and the president both want a full-year extension. The best way to resolve the difference between the two-month extension and the full-year bill, and provide certainty for job creators, employees and the long-term unemployed, is through regular order, as the speaker suggested.”

That’s the conference option. But Reid has made clear that he will only agree to negotiation after the two-month stopgap passes.

Democrats are trying to paint this as Boehner losing control of his caucus, and there’s a fair argument for it. Chuck Schumer today likened negotiating with Boehner to “nailing Jello to the wall.” It’s clear that he is not empowered to make decisions for his caucus. He agreed to let Reid and McConnell negotiate a deal and then pass it. When his caucus soured on the deal, he backed out of it.

Whether House Republicans didn’t want to take this payroll tax issue up again in the new year because they were getting pummeled by it in their home districts, or whether they genuinely oppose doing anything that aids the economy, the end result is broadly similar. But I cannot see how House Republicans would believe that it’s more advantageous for them to allow a big tax increase now, which is how this will be spun, than to deal with the issue in February. If the motivation is to tank the economy, you take the hit over the holidays and hope the President gets tagged for the poor economic performance in the elections.

We will see some action on this today, so stay tuned.