Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
The latest GOP gimmick comes from Speaker of the House Sen. Ted "Calgary" Cruz, an interloper in the House, whose Plan E is an a la carte funding of government agencies that the GOP will be embarrassed by if the Tea Party "Suicide Caucus" Shutdown continues – for veterans’ programs, national
parks and museums, and services in Washington – and to punish government agencies it detests, like the EPA and the IRS.
On Tuesday night, Plan E failed, but the GOP will bring it back up for a vote on Wednesday because they are fresh out of gimmicks. House
G.O.P. Pushes Piecemeal Approach as Democrats Stand Firm:
The Republicans suffered embarrassing losses on Tuesday night when three
bills — to finance veterans’ programs, national parks and museums, and
services in Washington — failed to get the two-thirds majority required
to pass under fast-track procedures.
The list of federal programs being singled out for financing is
expanding. Democrats criticized House Republicans on Tuesday for
choosing national parks over cancer research at the National Institutes
of Health. The response: a measure to finance the health institutes,
too. Congress had already passed legislation to make sure active duty
uniformed military forces would continue to be paid. Criticized for
leaving out the National Guard and Reserves, Republicans added them to
the favored list.
The White House has already threatened a veto.
“Consideration of appropriations bills in a piecemeal fashion is not a
serious or responsible way to run the United States Government,” the
White House budget office said. “Instead of opening up a few Government
functions, the House of Representatives should reopen all of the
Government.”
* * *
Democrats say they will not negotiate any changes to the health care
law, nor will they reopen the government piece by piece. To do so, they
said, would only encourage Republican brinkmanship.
Aides to the Republican leadership said the bills would be introduced on
Wednesday under ordinary rules that require only simple majorities, and
they should easily pass. But Democrats are likely to be granted
procedural votes of their own, which would be an opportunity to test how
many Republicans would defy their leadership and vote to reopen the
entire government without crippling Mr. Obama’s health care law — the
standoff that shut down the government.
As public anger grows, more Republicans are coming forward to call for such a rebellion.
* * *
Senate Democratic leaders say they plan to
immediately kill all three of the piecemeal House bills, arguing that
they will not be forced to choose between financing veterans’ programs
or cancer research.
Mr. Reid, the majority leader, said Mr. Boehner should “stop the games,
think about the people he is hurting, and let the House pass the
Senate’s bill to reopen the government with Republican and Democratic
votes.”
Republicans said they planned to make Democrats pay a political price
for voting against the bill financing veterans’ programs.
So all the Tea-Publican House leadership cares about here is creating fodder for its GOPropaganda PR machine for the conservative media entetainment complex — the true "leadership" of the GOP today. The Tea-Publican Party has abandoned any pretense to governing responsibly.
Steve Benen adds in The man without a plan:
There is, of course, the Senate bill, which is a center-right proposal
embraced by Senate Democrats and the White House, and which enjoys
bipartisan support in the House. If House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio)
brought it to the floor for a vote, it would very likely pass and the
shutdown would be over.
So why doesn't the flailing Speaker just
end this misery that enjoys the support of a Senate majority, a House
majority, and President Obama? Because as Robert Costa reported last night, Boehner would prefer to see the shutdown continue.
Based on my latest conversations with insiders, their plan isn't to
eventually whip Republicans toward a clean CR and back down after a few
days of messaging the shutdown, as some have believed; it's to keep
fighting, and, in the process, preserve the House GOP's fragile unity —
and maybe, if they're lucky, win a concession from Senate majority
leader Harry Reid.But that unity, more than anything, is critical for Boehner,
especially as the debt limit nears. Per his allies, his fear is, if he
brings up a clean CR, he'd be seen as conceding to Reid, who's seen as
the villain of villains within the House GOP…. In the press, he'd
likely be cheered for a profile in courage; within the House, the
decision would be seen by his critics on the right as a betrayal of the
highest order. There is nothing they detest more than the idea of
caving, and Boehner knows that.
This is critically important. Boehner and the House
Republican leadership have had weeks to come up with a coherent
strategy, and now that they've shut down the government, this is what
they've up with: wait for Democrats to start taking health care benefits
away from Americans because Republicans say so. That's the plan.
Having gone down this road, the GOP is willing to blow up the U.S. and world economy because they do not want to be seen as caving in front of the conservative media entertainment complex that controls the GOP.
Democrats must reject this a la carte "piecemeal" approach to budgeting, because it is a prequel to what the GOP wants to do with threatening the full faith and credit of the U.S. over the federal debt ceiling.
Earlier this year, the House GOP passed a bill for the "prioritization" of debt, paying only some of our creditors on time, but not all. This is effectively the managed bankruptcy of the U.S. Debt Limit Bill Passes House, Ordering Obama To Pay Only Some U.S. Creditors On Time (May 9, 2013):
Numerous independent economists have mocked such a scheme as irresponsible at best, deriding it as "the financial market equivalent of that Hieronymus Bosch painting of hell" and the first step to becoming a banana republic.
* * *
{E]conomists have warned that the "technical default" of paying only
certain bills on time would be only a little better than a full-fledged
default.
* * *
Yet even House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) admitted recently in an interview with Bloomberg TV
that the measure would effectively pay foreign creditors such as China
before many Americans with claims on the nation's treasury.
House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) seized on that admission, as did many other Democrats.
"Just yesterday Speaker Boehner admitted this bill means the United
States will voluntarily act like a bankrupt corporation and pay China
before we pay our troops," Hoyer said.
The top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee. Rep. Sander
Levin (D-Mich.), argued that the main purpose of the bill was to satisfy
members of the tea party and to offer the GOP political cover in a
potential debt limit standoff.
"It's being done to satisfy some within the Republican caucus or
maybe to try to provide some leverage in terms of bargaining with the
Democrats," Levin said in the floor debate. "This is playing with fire,
though, with the economy of this country. Those who vote for it, playing
with this fire, are going to burn themselves."
Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), the ranking Democrat on the House
Budget Committee, also slammed the bill as a "political insurance
policy" that Republicans believe would cushion any fallout over a debt
ceiling breach.
"The whole idea's a harebrained idea. The idea is premised on the
United States not paying all its bills. So let's figure out who to pay
first and who will not get paid at all, and that's just a totally
reckless approach for the United States government," he told HuffPost.
"If we were ever to default, [Republicans] would be able to point to
this bill and say we're having an orderly bankruptcy as opposed to a
messy bankruptcy," Van Hollen added.
The legislation, which is laughingly called the Full Faith and Credit Act, was slammed by Democrats as the "Pay China First Act." (It was DOA in the Senate).
It appears the corporate media has forgotten all about this GOP debt ceiling strategy. The next shoe to drop in this Tea Party "Suicide Caucus" Shutdown is to force the U.S. into a managed bankruptcy, and to turn this country into a Banana Republic.
Don't think the Tea Party "Suicide Caucus" will do it? Remember when the "conventional wisdom" was that Congress would never allow the Sequester Plan to go into effect? The GOP embraced it. Remember the "conventional wisdom" just a couple of weeks ago that Congress would never shut down the government? The GOP embraced it. These Tea-Publican economic terrorists are batshit crazy. What makes you think they won't blow up the U.S. and world economy, and try to force the U.S. into bankruptcy?