Cliffhanger

In a candid interview, the speaker discusses why he attempted to make a "grand bargain" with President Obama, why the talks were secret, what was behind the deal's failure and whether it's possible to achieve big deals in Washington.

Obama's former chief of staff talks about the difficulties of negotiating the nation's fiscal problems with a divided GOP. "To some degree, I guess ... I underestimated that separation between Boehner and much of the caucus that he was trying to control," he tells FRONTLINE producer Jim Gilmore.

FRONTLINE investigates the inside history of how Washington has failed to solve the country’s problems of debt and deficit. Drawing on interviews with key players in Congress and the White House, FRONTLINE shows how a clash of politics and personalities has taken the nation’s economy to the edge of the "fiscal cliff," and now to a second round of standoffs over the debt ceiling and sequestration.