America is NOT Dead: Move along, everybody, nothing to see here

[benjipwns]

Has the free market stepped in with a suitable replacement for our government yet?

http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/

[Mupepe]

Fucking healthcare.gov exchange doesn't allow you to choose a security question when signing up.  THIS SHIT DOESN'T WORK!  FUCK OBAMACARE!  DEFUND IT!  SHUT DOWN THE GOVERNMENT!

[huckleberry]

just re acquainted myself with an old high school friend who is now a self proclaimed "anarcho-capitalist". holy shit at his twitter feed. these people are fucking nuttier than nuts. Some of them really do have a bun it all to hell mentality.

[Eric P]

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_world_/2013/09/30/potential_government_shutdown_how_would_the_u_s_media_report_on_it_if_it.html

WASHINGTON, United States—The typical signs of state failure aren’t evident on the streets of this sleepy capital city. Beret-wearing colonels have not yet taken to the airwaves to declare martial law. Money-changers are not yet buying stacks of useless greenbacks on the street.

But the pleasant autumn weather disguises a government teetering on the brink. Because, at midnight Monday night, the government of this intensely proud and nationalistic people will shut down, a drastic sign of political dysfunction in this moribund republic.

The capital’s rival clans find themselves at an impasse, unable to agree on a measure that will allow the American state to carry out its most basic functions. While the factions have come close to such a shutdown before, opponents of President Barack Obama’s embattled regime now appear prepared to allow the government to be shuttered over opposition to a controversial plan intended to bring the nation’s health care system in line with international standards.

Six years into his rule, Obama’s position can appear confusing, even contradictory. Though the executive retains control of the country’s powerful intelligence service, capable of the extrajudicial execution of the regime’s opponents half a world away, the president’s efforts to govern domestically have been stymied in the legislature by an extremist rump faction of the main opposition party.

The current rebellion has been led by Sen. Ted Cruz, a young fundamentalist lawmaker from the restive Texas region, known in the past as a hotbed of separatist activity. Activity in the legislature ground to a halt last week for a full day as Cruz insisted on performing a time-honored American demonstration of stamina and self-denial, which involved speaking for 21 hours, quoting liberally from science fiction films and children’s books. The gesture drew wide media attention, though its political purpose was unclear to outsiders.

With hours remaining until the government of the world’s richest nation runs out of money, attention now focuses on longtime opposition leader John Boehner, under pressure from both the regime and the radical elements of his own movement, who may be the only political figure with the standing needed to end the standoff.

While the country’s most recent elections were generally considered to be free and fair (despite threats against international observers), the current crisis has raised questions in the international community about the regime’s ability to govern this complex nation of 300 million people, not to mention its vast stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.

Americans themselves are starting to ask difficult questions as well. As this correspondent’s cab driver put it, while driving down the poorly maintained roads that lead from the airport, “Do these guys have any idea what they’re doing to the country?”

[Joe Molotov]

 

[Cerveza mas fina]

Its hard to believe America is on cruise control for doom over healthcare not all the wars.

[radioheadrule83]

Trillions spent on horrible and wasteful wars, followed by a deregulated financial meltdown and bailout for the people who caused it = nary a whimper

Facilitating a reasonable insurance for people so ill fortune and ill health doesn't bankrupt them to actual death = BURN IT ALL DOWN, STOP PAYING EVERYONE


Watching with interest to see what awful knock on effect it ends up having for the rest of the world. Thanks again, GOP.

[Human Snorenado]

[Great Rumbler]

Trillions spent on horrible and wasteful wars, followed by a deregulated financial meltdown and bailout for the people who caused it = nary a whimper

Facilitating a reasonable insurance for people so ill fortune and ill health doesn't bankrupt them to actual death = BURN IT ALL DOWN, STOP PAYING EVERYONE

The Republican base loves shooting guns, especially at brown people. But helping the poors? Nopenopenope.

[Great Rumbler]

Oh, and don't worry about me during all this, guys. I've got enough anime stockpiled to last me for at least the next four months.

[Brehvolution]

Gold is already down over $30 today. 

[Cerveza mas fina]

You know it's not gonna happen anyway so why worry sillies.

Kosma: US policy expert

Sorry I assumed you don't live in a banana republic.

[Steve Contra]

Has the free market stepped in with a suitable replacement for our government yet?

[Joe Molotov]

You know it's not gonna happen anyway so why worry sillies.

Kosma: US policy expert

Sorry I assumed you don't live in a banana republic.

We live in more of a J.Crew, really.

[ToxicAdam]

Kind of odd, you think of this time as the most contentious government has ever been, but from 1976-1996 government was shut down 16 seperate times.

[radioheadrule83]

Kind of odd, you think of this time as the most contentious government has ever been, but from 1976-1996 government was shut down 16 seperate times.

So crazy from an outsiders POV... just reading about them now, the federal level ones I mean. There was a 21 day shutdown under Clinton... two thirds of a month. Crazy. What happens when things are resolved as far as employees are concerned? I would go absolutely crazy if threatened with lack of pay for over two thirds of a working month

[Steve Contra]

Kind of odd, you think of this time as the most contentious government has ever been, but from 1976-1996 government was shut down 16 seperate times.

I've heard this several times, and it sounds nice, but there's also a potential sovereign default in the same month!  I'd say yes, most contentious government in a long time.

[Joe Molotov]

Decided to see how things were going in Glen Beckistan, and I got this:

Rob Schneider becomes a Republican!

Joe Biden photographed holding a document that says Top-Secret on the cover (and nothing else) OMG MAJOR GAFFE!!

[Mr. Gundam]

What happens when things are resolved as far as employees are concerned? I would go absolutely crazy if threatened with lack of pay for over two thirds of a working month

What happens? They'll go back to work after a vacation with no pay.

My sister-in-law works for an NGO affiliated with the state department. She is furloughed and sitting at home now.

[ToxicAdam]

Didn't the workers who sat home last time end up getting paid? I think they did.

I've heard this several times, and it sounds nice, but there's also a potential sovereign default in the same month!  I'd say yes, most contentious government in a long time.

Maybe I'm too jaded now. I just see this all as grandstanding and a way to get media attention. Kind of like the 'fiscal cliff' nonsense that everyone insisted was a real thing. It's all manufactured drama that allows all kinds of people to vent about things.

[Eric P]

congress as gawker?

terrifying follow up thought: congress as buzzfeed

[Joe Molotov]

10 Hottest GOP Congressmen

[Steve Contra]

40 cats that look like Freshman Congressman

[Diunx]

I should probably get a loan for a plane ticket and steal a green card or something in Miami, who wants to help Diunx become a post shutdown American?

[Mupepe]

I should probably get a loan for a plane ticket and steal a green card or something in Miami, who wants to help Diunx become a post shutdown American?

Come to Tejas!  I'll vouch for you good buddy!

[Himu]

We are making slavery legal again in Texas, Diunx. Watch out you could be thought of as a Mexicano.

[Steve Contra]

There's a bunch of customs paperwork I can't access today so I had to delay a shipment today. 

[Diunx]

Have a dentist appoitment in a few hours so decided to stay and just rape some Americans instead.

[Mandark]

Didn't the workers who sat home last time end up getting paid? I think they did.

I've heard this several times, and it sounds nice, but there's also a potential sovereign default in the same month!  I'd say yes, most contentious government in a long time.

Maybe I'm too jaded now. I just see this all as grandstanding and a way to get media attention. Kind of like the 'fiscal cliff' nonsense that everyone insisted was a real thing. It's all manufactured drama that allows all kinds of people to vent about things.

You've said that before, and I'm still not really sure what you mean by it.


edit: also, I'm with Cohen.  Even during split government periods in the Reagan and Clinton years, some fairly major legislation was passed into law.  I don't know that you can quantify "contentious" but there's an aggressive lack of productivity these days that's pretty striking.

[Phoenix Dark]

Personally I think this is Boehner's "you see what happens, Larry" moment. His caucus has been demanding a shutdown for four years, despite the warnings from older reps who remember the 90s shutdowns. The tea party seems to think that this will magically end the reign of Hussein Obama. Reports show Boehner and Cantor didn't want a shut down, but caved to pressure from the far right.

The polls are unanimous so far: people are blaming republicans. So after a few days of this Boehner is probably hoping the moderates grow a pair of balls and demand a clean CR.

This also serves the purpose of giving Boehner an out on the debt ceiling. He gets to say he tried to end Obamacare, he even shut down the government to do so, but it didn't work. Maybe that will buy him some leeway to cave on the debt ceiling. Remember, he has already told K/Wall Street he won't allow a default.

[Yeti]

You are assuming the Republicans will act logically though. 

[Mr. Gundam]

You are assuming the Republicans will act logically though. 

Why would they start now?

[Mandark]

How much can Boehner actually want this job at this point?  Granted, someone becoming Speaker at all is a good indication that they're ambitious beyond reason, but once Romney lost, he had to know his job would be wrangling a bunch of nutjobs who think of him as mildly treasonous, as they careen from one near-disaster to another, without anything to show for it in terms of accomplishments or legacy.

It's like being the Raiders coach.  It'll be shitty and you'll have a bad track record by the end of it, but head coaching jobs are so hard to get, you might as well take it.

[Joe Molotov]

You are assuming the Republicans will act logically though. 

Why would they start now?

Yeah, but they only need 17 Republican votes. If Boehner and Cantor can't whip that many, then we might as well just let it burn down and rebuild from the ashes.

[Phoenix Dark]

There were reports/rumors last month that Boehner won't run for re-election.

It's hard to feel sorry for him though. I think he's a somewhat rational actor but the problem is that he has spent four years coddling extremism. This is nothing new of course, republicans have always had to deal with an angry, extreme right base, but Boehner and House leadership sat back and let outside forces (including Ted Cruz) usurp authority over members. Brian Beutler has an article about this:

This summer, a group of well-heeled, influential conservatives, and their standard-bearers on Capitol Hill, began pressuring Republicans to make new appropriations for the government contingent upon Obama agreeing to gut his own healthcare law. It’s hard to say exactly what roles publicity, rudderless rage and strategic obliviousness played in this effort, but it was very obviously doomed from the outset to leave Republicans on the hook for a shutdown while holding Obamacare harmless.

But Boehner and other GOP leaders did almost nothing to extinguish the campaign and it quickly became a litmus test for dozens of conservative Republicans — a minority of the party, but enough to threaten Boehner’s leadership, and scare more sensible members of the party into believing their careers would be at risk if they moved too quickly to support a straightforward extension of funds for the government.

http://www.salon.com/2013/09/30/gops_fatal_leadership_failure_the_real_story_behind_the_shutdown/

That was around the time when the Heritage Foundation started really flexing its muscles. Now you have 30-40 extremists calling the shots in the House, and Boehner is either too incompetent or unwilling to assert leadership. Or, as I floated earlier, he's allowing all this to happen knowing the plan will implode and make the tea party realize 32% of the country isn't 51% of the country.

[benjipwns]

GETTYSBURG, Pa., Oct. 1 (UPI) --
A Ku Klux Klan rally scheduled Saturday at the Gettysburg, Pa., National Military Park has been canceled due to the federal government shutdown.

The park is closed, and all permits for special events in October have been rescinded, a park statement said.

That includes two planned weddings and "First Amendment" demonstration of the white supremacist Confederate White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, which received a permit to congregate near Meade's Headquarters on the Gettysburg battlefield grounds during the upcoming weekend, the news website Pennlive.com reported Tuesday.

...

Richard Preston, head of the Maryland-based Klan group, said he has people looking into the possibility of holding the rally in Gettysburg's town square, adding he will likely attend a rally Saturday with no more than 10 participants.

He did not mention the number of people expected at the battlefield demonstration.

[Brehvolution]

edit: also, I'm with Cohen.  Even during split government periods in the Reagan and Clinton years, some fairly major legislation was passed into law.  I don't know that you can quantify "contentious" but there's an aggressive lack of productivity these days that's pretty striking.

In The Sopranos, they were called 'No show' jobs.

[Great Rumbler]

Republicans=

[Phoenix Dark]

meanwhile

The conservative activist who gained fame during the 2012 election for "unskewing" polls favorable to Barack Obama explained this weekend his newest revelation: the president is "actually" gay.

Dean Chambers, founder of UnSkewedPolls.com who now appears to work for The Examiner, said that Newsweek got it wrong when it ran a cover praising Obama for his evolution on gay marriage last year. Obama was not "basically" the nation's first gay president for his progressive stance on the issue, but actually so.

"I do believe that Barack Obama is in fact our first gay president," he wrote. "But I believe this for entirely different reasons. I believe the man actually is gay. Don't tell me his marriage to Michelle and having two children disproves that he's gay."

In the article, Chambers cites various sources claiming to show Barack Obama's closeted life in Chicago as a state senator. He takes it even a step further, however, in defending Obama's Christian faith by arguing that people of Muslim faith "are known to stone someone for being gay."

"Would you be a Muslim if it put you as risk for being killed because of your lifestyle choices?" he asks.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/unskewedpolls-founder-barack-obama-is-actually-gay

[Joe Molotov]

Unskewed Sexuality

[Yeti]

Secret Muslim Secret Gay

[Steve Contra]

Gay Muslim Atheist.  Quite the combo.

[Joe Molotov]

Don't forget black, Steve. Never forget black.

[Steve Contra]

Kind of hard to forget, if you know what I mean

[Phoenix Dark]

Gay Muslim Atheist.  Quite the combo.

But is he a Final Fantasy tard?

[Steve Contra]

Gay Muslim Atheist.  Quite the combo.

But is he a Final Fantasy tard?

[benjipwns]

"I do believe that Barack Obama is in fact our first gay president," he wrote.

James Buchanan has a sad.

[Dickie Dee]

Decided to see how things were going in Glen Beckistan, and I got this:

Joe Biden photographed holding a document that says Top-Secret on the cover (and nothing else) OMG MAJOR GAFFE!!

[Dickie Dee]

Unskewed Sexuality

You mean being straight?

[Phoenix Dark]

TLDR update: Ted Cruz has convinced House republicans to focus on limited appropriations bills to fund the government. The problem: they require 2/3s majority in the House. Republicans just failed 3 votes in the row - one to fund veteran care, one to open National parks, and one to open National monuments.

also:

Washington correspondent for The New Yorker Ryan Lizza said Boehner has to bring Republicans some concession – the medical device tax, or a shorter delay of the individual mandate, for example – if he wants to preserve his job.

In other words, Boehner cannot put forward a bill that funds the government, without some sort of Obamacare concession attached.

“The consensus seems to be that if he puts a clean continuing resolution on the floor, and gets no concessions whatsoever after shutting down the government, that he will lose his job as Speaker,” said Lizza. “That’s the bind he’s in right now.”

Robert Costa at NRO has been doing some great reporting on this

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. Thirty to forty conservatives would likely revolt against such a maneuver, and so would their backers in the conservative movement. 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.

uh oh

[Joe Molotov]

POTUS and the Senate have already told them to fuck off with that limited funding shit, but they're gonna keep dicking around with that idea until Ted Cruz comes up with something else, I'd imagine.

[Human Snorenado]

Jesus fucking shit, can you imagine someone from the lunatic wing in charge as Speaker during a debt ceiling debate?

THUNDERDOME

[Joe Molotov]

The Speaker of the House isn't required to actually be a member of the House, so might as well just stick Ted Cruz in there.

[Great Rumbler]

Jesus fucking shit, can you imagine someone from the lunatic wing in charge as Speaker during a debt ceiling debate?

THUNDERDOME

Might as well just go ahead and put a madman in charge, let's really show the public how far the GOP has gone down the rabbit hole.

[Phoenix Dark]

From the (conservative) National Review:

Pushing back against Reid and force him to cut a deal is another leadership objective. Behind the scenes, they’re irritated by his daily killing of anything the House passes and are eager to make sure he shares some of the political pain from the shutdown. Many House Republicans believe Senate Democrats are only hanging with Reid on every vote because he has assured them the House GOP will break, and they think if they can incrementally put pressure on Reid’s conference, his grip could be weakened.

trolled by an old Mormon lolol

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

[brawndolicious]

Either Reid flops or the next speaker is even less willing to compromise.

I'll go with the underdog and bet on #TeamReid. The shutdown ends when that CR is clean as a whistle. I'm not even sure what CR even means.

[Boogie]

You know it's not gonna happen anyway so why worry sillies.

Kosma: US policy expert

It takes a special kind of person to not only be ignorant about a given subject, but also to make a confident statement on said subject that is completely, utterly incorrect, and then when that complete wrongness is pointed out, to still have the balls to make a snarky condescending remark.

Kosma, are you sure you're not really a closet Republican?

[Great Rumbler]

I'm not even sure what CR even means.

Continuing resolution. Basically, it's a bill that temporarily funds the government until an actual budget bill can be put together.

[Yeti]

So Obamacare has taken effect. It can't be delayed anymore. What exactly are Republicans holding out for now?

[Shadow Mod]

How much can Boehner actually want this job at this point?  Granted, someone becoming Speaker at all is a good indication that they're ambitious beyond reason, but once Romney lost, he had to know his job would be wrangling a bunch of nutjobs who think of him as mildly treasonous, as they careen from one near-disaster to another, without anything to show for it in terms of accomplishments or legacy.

It's like being the Raiders coach.  It'll be shitty and you'll have a bad track record by the end of it, but head coaching jobs are so hard to get, you might as well take it.

Both jobs require herding thugs too.