Will a Government Shutdown Chill Congressional Republicans Out? No
A government shutdown was looking inevitable Friday: The Senate passed a resolution to fund the government through mid-November without stripping funding from Obamacare, a proposition House Republicans find unacceptable. The House plans to meet through the weekend, but it's hard to see how this gets resolved.
But hey, maybe it's for the best! That's the argument made by a rash of commentators, who argue that a government shutdown might actually be a good thing.
Todd Purdum in Politico: "Maybe it's time for the House Republicans to stop threatening and 'Just do it.'" Joshua Green in the Boston Globe: "I’m rooting for a shutdown and you should be too — at this point, it’s the safest way to jolt Washington back to its senses." Matt Yglesias in Slate: "A little government shutdown isn’t the worst thing in the world, and it’s much better to have this fight now rather than entertain months of herky-jerky crisis." Noam Scheiber in The New Republic: "If Boehner resigns himself to a shutdown ... suddenly the future looks manageable." Ezra Klein in the Washington Post: "It looks like we may have a shutdown after all. And that may be a good thing." Republican lobbyist John Feehery: "Maybe it’s time to ... lance the boil and to shut down the government for a while."
The basic argument all these writers make is the same: A shutdown, while unpleasant, would be less unpleasant than the default that would likely ensue if Congress doesn't raise the debt ceiling by mid-October. Why would shutting down the government make a default less likely? The idea seems to be that once House Republicans realize how badly the public is reacting to the chaos they've caused, they'll see the error of their ways, dispense with the theatrics, and start acting sane.
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http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/09/will-a-government-shutdown-chill-congressional-republicans-out-no/280091/
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