Keeping the status quo doesn't sound like much of a consolation prize.
Shouldn't the goal be to represent the people they were elected to represent and do the things they were elected to do? We don't elect people and send them to Washington to serve the Republican party.
Obama was starting to take heat for some of his petty tactics like closing the memorials and parks and stopping military death benefits. The longer the budget battle dragged on, he would have gotten even more desperate and petty. If the establishment Republicans had presented a united front instead of working to sabotage the resistance, things might have worked out differently. Even if they didn't agree with the tactic, they should have stood by their fellow Republicans, and do what they were elected to do, instead of surrendering on Day 1. Whether it's right or wrong to enter into a war, once you're in, you have to fight to win it.
Once Obamacare goes into full effect and more people start waking up to the fact that it's a bad law, it no longer matters because there's no reversing it at that point.
Establishment Republicans have been "compromising" and surrendering to the Democrats for five years. What has it gotten them? More importantly, what has it gotten us?