Democrats Vow To Shut Down The Government

by JASmius



In other words, that ever-diminishing portion of it that isn't on ever-upward-spiraling fiscal auto-pilot.  And that ain't much.

But why wouldn't the Dems make this power play?  It's not like it doesn't always work for them:

“We’re headed for another shutdown.”

Those words from Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) today confirm what Democrats have been planning behind closed doors for weeks: they are getting ready to shut down the federal government.

And thereby take it back over, even from the minority.

According to the Washington Post, Democrats’ plans for a shutdown begin with a “filibuster summer”:

“Charles E. Schumer says Senate Democrats aren’t afraid to be obstructionists, detailing a strategy of blocking appropriations bills and other Republican agenda items until they get what they want.”

Remember Dirty Harry's unleashing of the "nuclear option"?   Remember Democrats' jeering about "Republican obstructionism" when they were in the majority?  It seems that leopard never has any difficulty changing its spots, does it?

“The White House-backed plan ....

Just in case any of you forgot who's really calling the shots in this shootin' match.

....to get Republicans to support more spending for domestic programs … was developed in a series of closed-door meetings held over the course of several weeks. … To maintain their leverage, Democrats have decided to block all spending bills starting with the defense appropriations measure headed to the floor next week.”

And there it is.  The Democrat Party is perfectly willing to literally hold hostage the very lives of the American people to ram forward their insane, leftwingnut extremist agenda.  And, of course, the Republicans will get the blame for it on the line of, "GOP willing to let all Americans perish in horrible, agonizing nuclear fire to save a few bucks".

But again I ask, why would the Democrats not pursue the government shutdown strategy?  They are never held to account for their mis-actions.  The Republicans are always crucified, whether they're "guilty" or not.  And, most importantly, the Republicans always cave.  ALWAYS.

For conservatives, this is why elections never quite seem to matter.  If the Democrats win, they run the government and the country; if the GOP wins....the Democrats run the government and the country.  Maybe not as efficiently as if they were in the majority, but they run it nonetheless.  And this is that of which Chucky and Dirty Harry are reminding us yet again.

There comes a time, though, when there's no more road down which to kick the proverbial can.  No more future days in which to fight by running away today.  The problem is that we will never know just exactly when that time has arrived.

And that's the point of leadership.  Why govern a country on the template of determining how much weight a bridge can carry by driving bigger and bigger vehicles across it until it collapses, than weighing the last one and rebuilding the bridge?  In this case, the collapse will not be perfunctory, it will be catastrophic, and rebuilding it a highly unlikely option - at least as it once was.

I know, I know, Republicans will always be "strangers in a strange land".  They can only survive in that toxic Beltway swamp by never taking off their philosophical hazmat suits, at risk of being contaminated.  I get that.

But at this late stage of the game, the biggest contagion the GOP faces is fear.  Fear of the consequences of doing the right thing; governing sanely and responsibly and legally and constitutionally.  Fear that no matter what they do, they will lose.

But, to employ the delicious irony of quoting one of the Founding Fathers of American "Progressivism," "The only thing we have to fear is....fear itself".  And if We, The People are really going to punish Republicans for doing what we elected them to do, if we are that easily manipulated and bamboozled, then there is no reason for any Pachyderm to be a party or accessory to it.

And who knows?  With an embrace of aggressive, effective, and preemptive propaganda messaging, perhaps this Donk "worm" can be made to "turn" on them.

It'd be a great prelude to a Scott Walker blitzkrieg to the White House.