Republican in-fighting is becoming one of my favorite sports."The idea was first pushed by one guy: It was Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) who said two weeks ago that he and his party should shut down the entire federal government unless Democrats agree to block all funding of the Affordable Care Act, even if that denies health care coverage to millions of American families.
Then Rubio picked up some friends. The number of Republican senators endorsing this tactic grew, just over the course of two weeks, to 17--roughly a third of the Senate GOP caucus--including members of the Republican leadership."
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) was on board with this idea."But a funny thing happened on the way to the shutdown: all of a sudden, a fair number of Republicans, including Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), started to realize their party's idea was blisteringly stupid.
'I think it's the dumbest idea I've ever heard of,' Burr said. 'Listen, as long as Barack Obama is president, the Affordable Care Act is going to be law...I think some of these guys need to understand that if you shut down the federal government, you better have a specific reason to do it that's achievable. Defunding the Affordable Care Act is not achievable through shutting down the federal government. At some point you're going to open the federal government back up and Barack Obama's (still) going to be president."
The cynic in me can't help but wonder if this anti-shutdown rhetoric is an honest opinion or one that was seeded by a need to protect himself from a possible adverse voter reaction."Over in the House, Rep. Tom Cole, (R-Okla.), a deputy majority whip and close ally to Speaker Boehner, told Fox News, 'Seems to me there's appropriate ways to deal with the law, but shutting down the government to get your way over an unrelated piece of legislation is (the) political equivalent of throwing a temper tantrum. It's just not helpful. And it is the sort of thing that creates a backlash and could cost the Republicans the majority in the House.'"
Which I guess answers my previous question. They might WANT to shut down the government, but not if it costs them seats."If this plan implodes...it's going to make Sens. Rubio, Ted Cruz (R-Texas), and Mike Lee (R-Utah)--the ringleaders of the gambit--look awfully foolish...
...(If) the scheme falls apart, and even gets mocked by their own allies, it will reinforce the impression that these far-right senators are inept show-horses who aren't serious about governing and can't even execute their own bad ideas."
An outcome that, I admit, would not break my heart.
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