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The right’s new lie about its shutdown intentions
Ted Cruz and co. now claim this dispute is about veterans and reservists. Here's why no one should believe them
BY BRIAN BEUTLER
If Ted Cruz is making John Boehner dance like a marionette, then Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., is the guy helping Cruz keep the strings untangled.
He’s the author of the House version of the famous letter insisting that Republicans make funding the government contingent upon gutting Obamacare. He didn’t, and won’t get Obamacare defunded. But the signatories to that letter are a decent proxy for the group of hard-line Republicans who are holding Boehner’s speakership over his head and thus making the country ungovernable.
So it was a big surprise when he told reporters on Tuesday that, really, the government shutdown has nothing to do with Obamacare.
“This fight now has become about veterans and about national guard folks that perhaps — reservists that are not getting paid,” he said. “That’s where the fight is today. Obamacare is mandatory spending that’s going on.”
Well, that’s great news! If the government shutdown fight isn’t about Obamacare anymore, then opening the government back up should be a cinch. Could be done in a matter of minutes.
full article
http://www.salon.com/2013/10/03/republicans_government_shutdown_bamboozlement_is_working/
