What’s your prediction on when the shutdown ends? (If you want to say it won’t happen, that’s fine too.)
Whoever gets it the closest wins. I’m going with Friday October 11 at 3pm, since there’s a holiday weekend coming up after that.
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[…] I’m on record as thinking the shutdown will end on Friday evening. I don’t think that the GOP’s plutocrat wing is too amused by the party’s childish, strategically and tactically deficient brinkmanship. Support for my position from Morgan Stanley: […]
Joey Maloney
January 20, 2015, or whenever the Dems retake the House.
Poopyman
Monday, Oct 21 @ 9:00 PM EST.
No reason, just a random guess. My second choice would be around mid-December. And by that time there may be some bodies on the floor of the Republican caucus room.
schrodinger's cat
What is the prize?
Doug Milhous J
@schrodinger’s cat:
I’m trying to think of something.
Matt McIrvin
It will never end.
In about three weeks, following the debt default, the United States will collapse. Anybody’s guess whether we get a national government out of the resulting chaos. Maybe a military junta.
Do I really think this will happen? Probably not, but by staking out this position I get to look like a genius if it does.
strandedvandal
Oct 14 11:59pm.
lonesomerobot
For my answer, I present this art installation. It is called “Both sides”.
http://blog.lonesomerobot.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/screen-shot-2013-09-30-at-85618-am.png
Nemo_N
Good heavens, CNN is doing a fact-check on Obamacare.
NotMax
Worst season finale on a budget ever.
Citizen_X
@schrodinger’s cat:
While you’re roasting your sparrow under the overpass, you get to brag, “HAH! I have a sparrow to roast AND I was right about how long the shutdown would last!”
Villago Delenda Est
Yup, the crisis will only end when the Democrats are total, bill passing control of both houses of Congress. This means a simple majority in the House, and the termination with extreme prejudice of the silent filibuster in the Senate, so that a simple majority passes bills there.
Firing squads for teatard politicians are optional under this scenario.
Punchy
@schrodinger’s cat: How about an hour-long math lesson by Dr. Jones himself?
I’d fly out to NY to get my dx/dy on.
Eric U.
Probably the 21st, because that will mean my upcoming trip will be a big mess.
If it ever happens that tshtf, then I’m in a really bad spot because all the New Yorkers will be out here scrounging for food. Hopefully there will be a big wreck on I80 and they will have to walk so the people over by the NJ/PA border shoot them all first. But I’m not counting on it.
Botsplainer
@Doug Milhous J:
A sparrow roasted on a curtain rod and a slightly gone over remnant of a bottle of Sunny D scavenged from a landfill. Let the winner live like the new 1%.
? Martin
The Senate sends a clean CR back later today and Boehner brings the clean CR to a vote sometime around 11:30PM, after Hannity and company have run their shows. Enough of his caucus peels off and joins the Dems (who unanimously support it), and Boehner immediately takes the debt limit hostage in it’s place. No shutdown, but we’re right back where we started.
IowaOldLady
@Nemo_N: What are they finding?
Villago Delenda Est
@Nemo_N:
I’m sure that the report will be filled with lies. CNN…second most despised name in “news”.
WereBear
Mmm! Should be fermented by now!
Belafon
@Nemo_N:
ETA: What will truly be sad is when they rate the ACA as false for not accurately predicting how much cheaper the exchanges will be.
Ripley
12/12/12.
Too soon?
Face
Can our country default on Oct. 17th if it’s shut down? I cannot pay my bank my mortgage on a Sunday (or Saturday after 1), likewise is it really a default for Uncle Sam if the non-payment comes soley because the checkwriter is on furlough?
Mark B.
Halloween. Zombies will eat the brains of the Republicans and starve to death.
dmsilev
I’ll say the end of this week. Late Friday afternoon.
Elliot Rosewater
I’d have to go with Oct 16 and a double cave by the GOP.
Half the pain from caving on shutdown and default.
Boehner keeps speakership with a handful of Dem votes, Cantor cries.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Villago Delenda Est: at least Fox knows they’re doing what they’re doing, CNN is just a big pile of stumbling stupid
@? Martin: Today? You’re so far the only person on this thread more optimistic, if that’s the right word. I’m thinking between Wednesday and Friday, so I’ll split the difference and say Thursday between three and four pm eastern.
dmsilev
@? Martin: In that scenario, how long until we find Boehner’s body floating in the Potomac with half a dozen knives sticking out of his back?
Villago Delenda Est
@Belafon:
“And that’s when I unloaded the Glock into Leslie Blitzer, officer.”
peach flavored shampoo
Boehner will no longer be the House leader on Tuesday if he pulls this stunt with Dem support.
Villago Delenda Est
@Elliot Rosewater:
VDE giggles uncontrollably, causing disturbances all over western Oregon.
aimai
I think we’ll find Boehner dead of alcohol poisoning before he manages to bring a clean CR to the floor. He is just too scared of the bullies in his own caucus–I mean this in a real, personal, sense. He doesn’t have any friends or allies outside the Republican caucus and so he is entirely dependent on these people for what remains of his social life. People will do a lot but they won’t piss off the people they have to see and talk to every day.
NotMax
OT:
Well, finally dipped a toe into the 21st century. Did my first-ever online ordering after finding a place which sells my everyday little cigars for almost 75% less than what I pay here, even after figuring in the ridiculous shipping costs to Hawaii.
Don’t like not buying them at a local retailer, but a price difference that substantial is very hard to pass up.
Redshirt
Darth Sidious takes over the US Government, turning it into an Empire, and proceeds to wipe out all the Liberals, ushering in a 1000 year darkness.
That, or Friday.
? Martin
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I’m less optimistic. Shutdowns are painful but not terminal. Debt limit default is terminal. Boehner isn’t going to win the budget showdown, because it’s not painful enough for Reid or Obama to negotiate, and everyone knows it. Obama has the public ear on this one – only he can call a national address from the Oval Office. So the only endgame on it is that everyone digs in until the public gets so sick of the GOP that Boehner has to cave. Boehner knows this.
The endgame on the debt limit is unknown. Boehner will shift to it and see where it goes.
Nemo_N
Jesus Fuck, that CNN fact-check was bad/weird. They said that “maybe” you’ll be able to keep your doctor. Then a “lower premiums, high out-pocket-expenses” title card without explaining that it depends on the plan. It was over in less than 30 seconds.
It’s like they realized they can’t lie about it too much without looking like tools and decided to simply wobble their way through the piece.
shortstop
October 4, 9 p.m.
sparrow
@? Martin: I’m with Martin. I think it won’t happen. If it does, I’ll be pissed for lots of reasons, though the most personal one will be because it will affect our satellite operations (not flight controls, but target-of-opportunities if something interesting goes bang in the universe).
MattF
Hard to make predictions, particularly about the future. I’ll guess midnight, Oct. 16, since that’s when the debt ceiling comes crashing down. Obama will mint the magic platinum coin, which will pay all the debt and finance reopening the government and dare the House Republicans to impeach him, all at the same time.
Citizen_X
@dmsilev: I seriously would not be surprised one of these days to hear that Cruz’ body has been found in the trunk of an abandoned car somewhere in DC.
Wiesman
I think it will be pretty short. Thursday, October 3rd. The House will time their vote so that the president has to interrupt his anniversary dinner with Michelle in order to sign the bill and restart the government, so… 8-9 PM EST, October 3rd.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
It doesn’t end until the SS and Medicare checks stop coming. Then, it ends IMMEDIATELY.
dmsilev
@Villago Delenda Est: Are there any jurisdictions left where ‘needed killing’ is a valid defense?
? Martin
@dmsilev: Florida.
SATSQ.
NotMax
@? Martin
Yup. There will be a very short-term CR (maybe 7 days).
FDRLincoln
The shutdown will last 27 hours until the lunatics back down, pass the clean CR, but then go all-in on the debt limit.
The debt limit is breached on October 20. The GOP refuses to back down on that one. Global markets seize up, the stock market crashes on October 24 (forever known as Black Thursday), Obama invokes the 14th Amendment, the House Impeaches him on a party line vote, the Senate refuses to convict, we have a constitutional crisis.
Ted Cruz is elected president in 2016 with 271 electoral votes although he loses the popular vote by more than two million. Civil War II Electric Boogaloo is in full swing by 2018.
By 2040, the Terran Empire has been established, and those of us who are still alive are either in work camps serving the Koch brothers or have capitulated and are now wearing goatees.
NonyNony
@peach flavored shampoo:
Sure he will. Here’s how it goes down:
*) Boehner passes the bill with Democrats and a handful of Republicans
*) House Republicans revolt, stick an assorted collection of motley fools up as their candidates for Speaker, not one of which actually has enough support to win 51% of the House
*) Nancy Pelosi keeps careful track of the votes in the House and has exactly the number of Democrats that it takes to fuck with the Republicans vote for Boehner when the time for a vote comes.
*) Chaos ensues. Republicans repeat until they realize that Boehner is the only guy that they can all agree sucks the least.
*) Boehner gets stone cold drunk as he realizes he’s stuck with this rodeo for another year.
People forget – the Speaker of the House is not just whoever the majority party decides to stick up on the podium. You need to get 50% + 1 of the House to vote for a guy/gal to get them up on the Speaker podium. If there’s a single GOP candidate who could get that kind of support right now, he/she would actually be the Speaker and Boehner would be spending his afternoons NOT dealing with the crazy loons in his caucus.
Boehner is stuck with the job. And if Pelosi is half the political animal she appears to be, the GOP won’t be able to replace him until they get enough of their own caucus to support a single candidate. Considering that the GOP caucus in the House seems to ONLY be united on the idea that anything Obama does they oppose, it is a bit hard for them to coalesce around a single Speaker candidate (especially given that anyone smart enough to form a coalition for a coup wouldn’t want the job…)
Rommie
@? Martin: That’s my guess as well: Boehner punts on the shutdown with the help of D’s tonight. He avoids the tea-boarding by promising a line in the sand about the Debt Ceiling later in the month, as it got “results” the previous time.
? Martin
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony: That’s actually up to Obama. He has wide discretion in how to implement the shutdown. If he says that the border patrol isn’t essential, then they go home. The elected officials from Texas seem to think this won’t have an impact. Let’s just see about that… I would also support the USDA saying that no meat processing can take place after today due to the lack of inspections, and customs officials going home and closing down all of the ports, and petroleum pipelines shut down because the DOE folks can’t monitor.
Let’s see how long Texas can hold out.
NonyNony
@Wiesman:
Sadly, I suspect that could actually happen.
Cacti
Why should it matter, Doug.
It’s not a big deal politically, right?
Anoniminous
One hour after the Senate version is brought to the floor of the House. Either Boehner will sober up and do it or Pelosi will force it though by a discharge petition.
As annoying – from an outsider’s perspective – and damaging to those who are going to be sent home raising the Debt Ceiling is the real battle and this is the set-up for that. The administration and the Democrats in Congress have to pass the CR to get a “clean” Debt Ceiling Bill through the House.
ETA:
@NonyNony:
Agree.
cmorenc
@Elliot Rosewater:
QUERY: Let’s assume for argument that the only impediment to such a re-alignment of power in the house of representatives is that a sufficient number of saner, *relatively* more moderate GOP house members exist in districts where they are sufficiently safe against the threat of a successful tea party primary challenge. Is the number of such presumably “safe” GOP members sufficient, if only they were willing to form such a governing coalition?
OK, we’re ignoring for sake of argument whether Boehner himself is among those in a safe-from-tea-party challenge district and we’re assuming he would go along, and that the house dems would go along as well, preferring the prospect of halting destruction to the advancement of further progressive achievement until they can regain a majority with democratic reps only.
That there are so many assumptions and big, at best marginally plausible ifs in this scenario tells why the prospects of it happening are so remote.
? Martin
@NotMax: No, the CR will be until mid november. That gets through the debt limit and gets everyone back to working on the budget. Reid wants to deal with the sequester, but he wants the big game (the debt limit) over with first.
Belafon
@Cacti: Breaking Bad didn’t matter much politically either, and yet we have multiple post about it.
Redshirt
@FDRLincoln: I think you’ve got it. Terran Empire is the best Empire!
Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937
Jan 1, 2015
burnspbesq
May 1, 2015. It will take the newly elected Democratic majority in the house, under the bumbling “leadership” of Speaker Nadler, that long to agree on a budget and get it over to the Senate.
Chickamin Slam
The shutdown will last long enough for a revolving door of Republican Senators and House members to go on Meet the Press and tell their side of the shutdown. “Obama is Black.” “Harry Reid is awful.” “Nancy P once yelled at me.” They all want their complementary David Gregory bobblehead they get for making an appearance.
mistermix
Gonna happen, done by the end of the week, say 10/5.
jayackroyd
2 am Wednesday. I’ll be the only one who picks that anyway.
lonesomerobot
Republicans will close the government and default on the debt. Chaos will ensue. Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Mike Lee will be forced to escape civilization and lead a rag-tag group of House Teahadist Republicans into the mountains, who conduct raids on Socialist-held areas of what used to be America. Trouble comes for these plucky patriots, however, when Ted realizes this has all but obliterated his hopes of becoming President, so he turns informant, giving up the whereabouts of the group, in hopes of being able to reintegrate with what’s left of America and begin once more down the path to his greatness. Meanwhile, Rand Paul and Mike Lee sneak down to an internment camp where John Boehner is being held by the Communists (socialist / communist – they’re all the same, right?). Boehner, suffering from severe alcohol withdrawal, fights through tears, exlaiming, “AVENGE ME, BOYS! AVENGE ME!” Rand Paul shoots Ted Cruz in the head after discovering his betrayal. They all die in a daring raid at the end, except of course Jennifer Gray, who goes on to star in Dirty Dancing, and Steve King, who marries a fetching Mexican drug-running princess with calves the size of cantaloupes.
The end.
Zifnab25
@FDRLincoln:
This is truly the darkest of timelines.
balconesfault
October 8, 11:45 pm
The Federal Agencies are already prepping to play hardball with the PR campaign. By Friday, the media is going to be filled with stories listing critical business-related meetings and deadlines (grants, approvals, permits, etc) that have been being missed thanks to the government shutdown.
A weekend of mulling those over, and growing realization by the business community that the Dems aren’t going to back down, and the shutdown is going to be costing them serious money – and we’re going to have GOP Reps hitting the floor on Monday looking for face saving.
MattF
@lonesomerobot: So, you’re saying neither vampires nor zombies. You some kind of radical, hmm?
The Other Chuck
My prediction is it doesn’t happen, or lasts no more than a couple days, so that the Republicans can claim some semblance of high ground in their private universe in order to move their ransom demands into the debt ceiling. You have to let a few hostages go at the beginning, see, unless you want SWAT to breach the building right away.
ET
My totally random thought is that there isn’t a way it is less than a week but not sure it will go a month so I would say some times in the 2 to 3 week range.
burnspbesq
DOJ is betting on a shutdown. It is reportedly filing suit against North Carolina under the Voting Rights Act today.
I wonder if Holder has enough balls to go in ex parte and get a TRO which would remain in effect as long as the District Court is shut down.
WereBear
@? Martin: True: the Republicans have always counted on the President to not want to “bring the pain.”
I say, if the R’s want a shut down, SHUT IT ALL DOWN.
It would take a couple of hours to have capitulation. Maybe, less.
Chris
China gets tired of watching a group of howling psychos threaten to destroy the economy of one of their biggest trading partners (and thereby seriously harming their own), and finances a Pinochet style coup in the United States. Our business, political and media elites, thrilled to finally have a free hand to show all those pesky peasants who’s boss, go along with it. Liberty dies with thunderous applause. The end.
Cacti
It will last until the olds don’t receive that first Social Security check.
JPL
@Elliot Rosewater: That’s what I think but I’ll go with October 15th just to be different. I do think the President will give them Keystone Pipeline in order to mend fences. He’s still a believer after all these years.
? Martin
@WereBear:
That’s what I would do. Why make it easy for them? I would specifically target those things that they most care about, like border security and business. But then I’m an asshole who would never be elected, because I’m an asshole.
pluege
the question really is: of the 3 players, who caves:
1) tea party loons
2) the rest of the repubs, i.e., boehner and the tea party boy-toys
3) obama and the vichy dems
I put my dates on:
1) boehner and the tea party boy-toys: within 4 days
2) obama and the vichy dems: before 12:00 tonight or not for 7-10 days
3) tea party loons: never (they’re loons after all and this whole kerfluffle is about their racism and their massive egos)
Zifnab25
Two days after the DOW loses over 200 points, the House will reconvene and blame Obama, but pass a clean CR. The Senate will attempt to pass it again, and Ted Cruz will lead a last-ditch filibuster maneuver in which he drops trow and moons the assembled Senators. Seven elder statesmen drop dead on the spot from the shock of impropriety and the cloture motion fails. The DOW loses another 200 points while the remaining Wall Street loyal Senate GOP holds Ted Cruz down while John McCain kicks him in the dick. The Senate finally passes the bill and Obama signs it.
The DOW regains more than half its loses, but it is discovered that in the meanwhile a cartel of Goldman Sachs investors, Exxon board members, and Koch Bros billionaires have secured a 51% stake in the entire continental United States. With their superior financial leverage, they seize control of House and Senate in the world’s first banker-lead financial political coup. Barack Obama flees into exile, while a rag-tag team of DailyKos followers and Anonymous members form guerrilla bands in the countryside.
A civil war breaks out. Tens of millions are killed in the fighting. Mark Halperin insists that both sides do it while being dragged through the streets towards the guillotines. When the dust settles, a bread of super-intelligent meme-posting kitty cat has securing full dictatorial control over what remains of the East Coast, while Lord Emperor Rick Perry and his cyber-mechanized army of elderly Medicare Republicans controls the Mid-west. Apple, Google, and Microsoft have assumed a triumvirate over the West Coast, which prospers under their benevolent internet-run hive mind.
RSA
Let’s see. Given that I’m expecting U.S. government funding to be allocated to my research group by the end of this month, I predict that the shutdown will happen; the universe really doesn’t like me. When will it end? Cannot predict now.
Tone in DC
@Villago Delenda Est:
This isn’t on the topic, but still.
Could someone possibly give that idiot something to cry about? A two by four makes the proper impression, I figure.
I know I should not want to see anyone injured, but these useless, poor excuses for human beings make me physically ill these days. /rant
Three weeks of shutdown, just like in 1995.
Violet
@Cacti: Not going to happen. Those checks are still going to go out.
WereBear
@? Martin: Crouching Democrat, Hidden Asshole!
There wouldn’t have to be any pain, if it’s announced a week or two beforehand. However long it takes to sink into Teahadist Skulls.
Makes for a most excellent line in the sand. How many Teahadis want to keep their jobs? How many Republicans decide to be “sane” to keep theirs? Are they serious about say, the Border, or just blowing smoke? Let’s shut down the FAA and see them get home, hitchhiking.
Hungry Joe
The Twelfth of Never.
Nah. But whenever anyone asks me when something is going to happen, I say “The Twelfth of Never” just because I really like saying “The Twelfth of Never.” My wife says it gets tiresome. Shows what she knows.
Original Lee
Wednesday, October 9, 2:30 PM. It needs to last more than a week in order to justify the stupendous stupid cost of shutting stuff down and restarting it, but less than two weeks because otherwise the whole payroll system gets borked.
Villago Delenda Est
@? Martin:
Being an asshole is not a disqualifier for elective office. Ted Cruz and Rand Paul prove that.
Belafon
@Chris: Needs more light saber.
? Martin
@WereBear: Oh, right. TSA could be sent home – they’re new since 1996. So, airports would be running but with almost no security staff. Lines will be catastrophically long.
Villago Delenda Est
@WereBear:
A meat cleaver could sink into Tehadist Skulls in only a few seconds. Expediency is our best course of action here.
Woodrowfan
October 21.
FWIW, my wife is a govie. She goes in for 4 hours tomorrow to close everything down. Then she comes home along with much of the rest of the population of DC. She’ll be paid this week as it’s already been processed, but I am worried about the 17th. God, I hate the Republicans….
Tone in DC
@lonesomerobot:
She had sightless eyes
Telling him no lies
Knocking him out with those (Latin) American thighs
aimai
@? Martin: Thats not true. Lots of the government does not have the ability to prioritize.
Jay C
Here’s a fun scenario:
Boehner caves (as expected) on the shutdown. The House Teatards revolt and challenge him for the Speakership, putting up Eric Cantor – or, since Cantor is probably too smart to want to step in that particular bucket of shit, Louie Gohmert or somebody.
Sane Republicans get fed up with the whole circus and (in return for some perks) support Nancy Pelosi. Nancy Smash gets the gavel back, and makes history (again) by being the first Minority-Party SotH. Teabagger heads explode; hilarity ensues.
@lonesomerobot:
LOL’d at this: there’s probably some screenwriter in LA pitching this very story to a producer as we type….
WereBear
I’m all set, then! (Click on my nym to find out why…)
jf
You mean like, say, January 2009 to January 2011? When the Dims managed to pass a hugely flawed health care bill of enormous value to the “health insurance” industry, the Lily Ledbetter Act, and very damn little else. When the Dims would not even bring the Employee Free Choice Act to a floor vote? Those Dims? That control? Thanks for a great chuckle the Monday morn!
Sloegin
The core issue is the Social Security checks. They’re still going out in a shutdown. Oldsters get to vote for baggers and radicals without any thought to the damage it causes.
Nothing changes as long as Oldsters and retiring boomers can continue to rant and rave and yell at clouds (and vote) without personal consequence.
Patrick
@Nemo_N:
That’s funny. According to CNN, Obamacare was overturned by the USS. CNN/FoxNews is the last network I would go to for a fact-check.
Cacti
@? Martin:
Yup.
Make every defense contractor in a Republican district, first in line to not get paid. Declare all Customs and Border inspection stations non-essential in Arizona and Texas. Suspend Coast Guard operations in every red state port city.
aimai
Does it occur to anyone that given that the biggest backers of the tea party are basically the Koch brothers that they are timing the market and shorting shares knowing that they can force the Republicans back gto the table with a CR anytime they want to? My money is on a few hours after the Koch Brothers see the market crash, buy up what they want at the lowest price, and call their wholly owned subsidiaries in the Republican party and order them back to work.
Cassidy
Know where your supply caches are. Also, the 2-3 story square storage facilities tend to have lots of cool, usable stuff in them and only 1-2 entrances.
Seanly
I’m stocking up on shotgun shells, extra right sleeves for my leather jacket and gas for my MFP Interceptor.
I think this drags out to right before the default.
If the Repubs win, they will want more in a month and if they lose they will ask for the same & more in a month.
I’m of a mind that we just let the end come & let the next sentient life on Earth give it a go in a few thousand years. We had a good run – Shakespeare, moon landings, etc., but we’re terminally short-sighted and kinda suicidal.
Woodrowfan
@aimai: sure, but I suspect that’ll work about as well as Dr. Frankenstein trying to control his monster. “OK, you destroyed the village. You can come back. I said, come back. Hey! where are you going COME BACK!!”
MikeJ
@Zifnab25: Dow is not an acronym, so all caps are not needed.
It’s already down 100 today.
celticdragonchick
4 PM on October the 18th after the debt ceiling is breached and Obama declares the debt ceiling unconstitutional. Boehnor allows the clean CR bill to go forward in order to then gear up for the impeachment vote.
schrodinger's cat
@Zifnab25:
We are already here, why the future tense?
celticdragonchick
@aimai:
Funny you should mention that, since some GOP congressmen were shorting various financial futures right before the last debt ceiling fiasco in 2011 and made a killing…
Cacti
@MikeJ:
Wall Street is starting to look like it’s ready to take out some of the trash it put in office in 2010.
The President & CEO of the bank lobby wrote an op-ed in the WaPo, basically telling the GOP not to fuck around with debt ceiling.
Punchy
I had one of these in my college apartment. Bought cases and cases of it, drank it down, tapped the appropriate kidney(s), flushed. Rinse and repeat.
The Dangerman
@? Martin:
So close! I think the Senate sends back a near clean CR and it passes late tonight (I smell the Med Device Tax getting the axe to show Reid and Obama “negotiating”).
Yes, we will be right back to a crisis in a couple weeks.
Villago Delenda Est
October 15th. Military pay checks at Fort Bragg, NC, bounce. Elements of the 82nd Airborne drop on Capitol Hill, round up the 15 to 20 non totally batshit insane Republicans, and force them at gunpoint to swear fealty to Nancy Smash.
Nancy Smash assumes speakership, uses big gavel to beat the living shit out of Steve Stockman and Louie Gohmert. Wild applause erupts across most of the country at this action. Teahadies rise in revolt, a million hoverround scoot starts towards Washington in protest, but hoverround jams around Waffle Houses impede progress.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Rick Perry plans his political comeback which is tragically cut short by Ted Cruz tripping him as he walks out the door to destiny.
Cacti
@The Dangerman:
The new House CR is going to be tabled by the Senate. It will be up to Boner to decide if he will allow the clean CR sent by the Senate to go to the House floor for a vote.
The Dangerman
@peach flavored shampoo:
Yes, he will; if there is a mutiny, the Reps will split votes while Dems all vote for Pelosi. who will be speaker for JUST long enough for the Reps to go puke in toilets and trash cans, followed by a new vote where they agree to Boehner again.
Bill E Pilgrim
The Republicans will pitch a new reality show that’s a mix of “There, I Fixed It” and “Breaking Bad”, called “There, I Broke It”.
The concept, in which viewers watch Congress make desperate cheap ass attempts to hold things together with duct tape and bailing wire only to have Republicans stomp it to pieces again, will get a development deal and become a hit show, and Republicans will go Hollywood and make so much money that they lose interest in trying to pretend to govern anymore, will resign en masse, and all go live in the Valley.
“It’s amazing really” said one lawmaker back in DC, “that we ever got anything done at all before they left”.
Okay well it could happen.
WereBear
@aimai: Occurred to Mr. WereBear
Anoniminous
@Cacti:
That’s very interesting. Reid is playing hardass.
Punchy
This is some funny shit.
Mike E
I’ll say on my birfday, 10/10, just because.
Jed Lewison sez at GOS that the Hastert Rule will be discarded like one of those full opened bottles of Yuengling Cole found in his kitchen cabinet. All it will take is 17 Repubs to cross the Rubicon and a clean funding bill will happen.
ruemara
I’ve considered the government shut down when I got the election results from 2010 and said, “My god. We’ve handed the wallet of the nation to a bunch of psychopaths.”
Cacti
@Anoniminous:
At this point, that’s pretty much the only way to prevent one of the Senate teatards from causing a shutdown through procedural delay. It only takes a simple majority vote and doesn’t allow the opportunity for filibustering.
askew
Thursday, October 10th at 11:00 a.m. because Congress rarely works beyond Thursdays as they need to get home.
schrodinger's cat
The sale of tinfoil hats must be booming.
Cacti
@ruemara:
I’ll never forget “progressive” heroes like Ed Schultz telling Dems not to vote in 2010.
Greg Joseph
Tomorrow. I just read at 2 o clock today, republican members only meeting. Bring your own bottle
DanF
53 hours. Why fifty-three hours? Because it’s one more hour than Obama’s age. SUCK IT NOBAMA!
– GOP
Suffern ACE
November 6. At some point both parties will try to read the results of the November 5 elections into a statement on voter sentiment. If they decide Christie winning in New Jersey means that the Dems need to cave or that Cunicelli losing Virginia means that the Republicans need to cave, we’re back to ground 1. The Media will decide that the Dems lose no matter what the outcome.
The worst scenario possible will be Cunicelli winning.
Chyron HR
@Cacti:
What part of “DIMS DIMS DIMS” did you not understand?
? Martin
Another thought on this is that Boehner goes with the shutdown through the debt limit deadline to allow him to pass a clean debt limit while keeping the govt shut down. That gives him an out, and who the hell knows how the shutdown ends.
I don’t know – could go either way to me.
Anoniminous
@Cacti:
I agree. And I agree it’s a good tactic, cuts Cruz out of the loop for one thing.
I’m surprised Reid would do it. I didn’t expect he would have the nous.
Cacti
@Anoniminous:
House Dems have also taken to piling on Boehner in their public statements, referring to “Speaker Cruz” as the driving force in the House GOP.
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
Boehner is in a tough position vis a viv the crazies. Sure, he can offer a clean CR to the entire house and prevent a shutdown but this won’t get the shutdown fever out of the minds of the crazies and we’ll just be doing this all over again in a few months.
That’s why it’s impossible to predict whether or not there is going to be a shutdown. If he just keeps putting off a shutdown, we’ll just keep getting more crazies elected every two years until they can do it without Boehner. We have to let them detonate their dynamite vests, unfortunately.
? Martin
Interesting.
Look what the GOP budget sensibility is reaping. Someone is investing in national exceptionalism, and it’s not us.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I think Reid gets a bad rap when you consider what he has to work with. He’s already had to pull Manchin’s knife out of his back on this, and has somehow managed to keep Pryor and Landrieu quiet.
hoodie
A few days at most, if it happens at all. The shutdown may actually be more a pain in the ass for Obama than the debt ceiling. The latter scares the financial folks more, but Obama can resolve that by taking the position that the debt ceiling is unconstitutional, use the platinum coin, whatever. What will the GOP do? Impeach him? Everyone will soon realize that’s a loser, because the Senate won’t convict and the Supreme Court won’t touch it. The markets would stabilize after a momentary panic and the debt ceiling suddenly becomes useless as a political tool for the GOP. Which is why the GOP won’t do it. They need to satisfy the base with some meaningless PR stunt that will end up costing millions, which is what the shutdown gives them. They’ll get their little PR stunt in, and then relent for some face-saving thing like the medical device tax.
artem1s
friday, 8PM. I have plans to go to Mesa Verde the week after. basterds better not ruin my trip.
also, BB playoffs will have commenced in earnest by then and the congresscritters whose districts are involved will want to scoot home to get in some face time on the TVs. bad form to be hanging out at the ball park and playing hooky at your job. If the Reds are still in by the weekend, Boehner is just going to look even more incompetent to the folks back home in Cincy.
either way, the guy is toast. he might as well not even bother coming back to DC.
cckids
@Jay C: Speaking of Hollywood, I’ve got “Argo” on in the background while reading this. Bryan Cranston just said “This is the best bad idea we’ve got”.
Kind of where we are as a country right now, isn’t it?
chopper
dunno. i’d give it the better part of this week, maybe through monday. hope my flight this thursday doesn’t get all cocked up.
KG
@Matt McIrvin: eh, country’s too big for a military junta. I’d bet a break up the republic. The South gets to be the confederacy it’s always wanted (they were the ones mostly opposed to the constitution of 1789). NYC becomes a city state. California becomes its own country, we probably take Oregon, Nevada, Washington, and maybe, just maybe Arizona (Colorado and Utah get kicked out of the Pac-12)
cckids
@artem1s:
Yeah. I’m headed to Death Valley 1st weekend in November. It takes months to get respite care for my son (actually, we’re flying #2 son home from college for the weekend to do it). They better not ruin this for me, either. Dicks.
burnspbesq
@aimai:
Evidence?
low-tech cyclist
What is our definition of when the shutdown ends?
a) When both houses of Congress have passed the same CR?
b) When Obama signs it?
c) When Federal employees return to work?
d) Other?
Suffern ACE
@KG: Well at least if Seattle meets Denver in the Super Bowl, we can call it a World Championship that will actually have some kind semblance of an actual international event.
shelly
Forget the shut-down. Here on the East Coast, my personal count-down is what hideous storm is gonna hit us this October. 2011 we had a freak blizzard that cut power for five days. 2012 was the Super Storm Sandy that we’re still recovering from.
Anoniminous
@Cacti:
heh. Good for them.
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Ok, I’ll accept that.
I’m not a fan of Reid but my comment came off as more critical of Reid than I am.
Tone in DC
@Villago Delenda Est:
The folks down the hall are wondering what I’m chuckling at.
They’re talking about Flushed Limburger. Screw ’em.
Thanks, I needed that.
WereBear
@burnspbesq: I’ll accept prior bad acts forming a pattern of behavior.
Yatsuno
@Mike E: Better your birfday than mine, Oct 30.
Doug Milhous J
@Cacti:
It matters because some people will be getting furloughed, some vital services will be cut off.
Poopyman
@? Martin: I blame Ed Snowden.
dogwood
I assume the shutdown will occur and last until President Obama invokes the 14th Amendment to subvert the Republicans’ refusal to pay the bills. Hence impeachment proceedings will ensue. No president, not even the miserable George W, would ever allow a default of choice. I
reflectionephemeral
Friday 10/4, 7pm.
I don’t think the plutocrat wing of the GOP is especially happy right now. They’re going to try to, well, shut that whole thing down, where “whole thing” = “shutdown”.
Violet
@Doug Milhous J: On the new “Orange Room” on the Today Show–it’s some kind of social media monitoring thing–they asked if the government shut down will affect you. 56% of whoever–Twitter respondents maybe?–said it wouldn’t affect them.
YellowJournalism
@NotMax: Still not as bad as the “Dexter” finale.
JGabriel
October 18th.
Teabaggers believe that the only reason Republicans lost the shutdown battle with Clinton in ’96 was because the GOP blinked first.
This means the party extremists will keep the gov’t shutdown until we default on the 16th, which is when they’ll break out the booze, slap each other on the back, and congratulate themselves on standing firm against the commie libtards. John Boehner will cry.
On the 17th they get all the irate calls from their corporate donors, which leaves them in a state of dismay. On the 18th, they cave.
drkrick
@KG: OT, but opposition to ratification in 1789 wasn’t particularly concentrated in the South. The Carolinas and Georgia had no strong position of their own and signaled they would follow the lead of Virginia. Pennsylvania, on the other hand, might not have ratified without some procedural sleight-of-hand on the part of the pro-ratification forces, and both Massachusetts and New York were close votes.
On the other hand, South Carolina regretted ratification and started what would become a nearly 70 year campaign for disunion in short order.
MikeJ
@KG:
If California is smart they take Colorado too. They need everything that is upstream in their water supply.
mclaren
@Matt McIrvin:
Military junta?
Heavens no! The population of the United States will spontaneously convert to Islam and bow down as one in the direction of Mecca. It’s all part of Obama’s Islamic communist fascist Manchurian Candidate master plan, don’tcha know?
Birthmarker
@The Other Chuck: This. It will either get stopped between now and about 9am tomorrow or last less than 72 hours. If the stock market drops significantly, hysteria will break out.
BTW the STOCK bill Congress passed after the uproar about the insider trading has been quietly gutted to no longer apply to anyone but the elected official. Aides etc., are exempted.
Birthmarker
Southern Beale
@Joey Maloney:
LOL.
Southern Beale
Maybe I’m in denial but I predict some 11th-hour reprieve as the Wall Streeters and plutocrats realize how royally fucked they’ll be and are finally able to exert pressure to forge a deal.
But will they ditch the Tea Party monster they created? Nah. They’ll continue to believe they control Frankenstein and we’re doomed to repeat this farce every 8-12 months until all the old Republicans die.
chopper
@Villago Delenda Est:
as the camera pans away from the carnage, it stops to focus on Elizabeth Warren standing on a pile of skulls, a spear in one hand…
Gopher2B
October 15, 7:00 pm. Just in time for the nightly news (because these dinosaurs thinks it matters) and after a day of incredible volatility and crashes in the market due to the debt ceiling.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
@lonesomerobot:
I love that movie!
Teabaggerines!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Southern Beale: Jason Chaffetz is pissing off John McCain, which is both fun to watch and puts a breach in their credibility with the media
If I were OFA, I would do quick commercial for the DC market of that Boehner interview where he tells Diane Sawyer that Obamacare is the law of the land, settled by the 2012 election, just to humiliate the old lush and to work the refs
StringOnAStick
@aimai: Good point, Aimai. I’ve read people here and elsewhere say that the Kochs and their fellow 0.001% will not allow a debt default because it will hurt their holdings, to which I say: they. do. not. care. If they did, they would have yanked the congressional choke chain long before today, and yet they didn’t.
When you are that rich even an economic collapse isn’t going to hurt you much, and everyone else will get hurt more so they’ll still be on top. Plus, all assets will be on sale too, so this really works out for the Koch class, and possibly accomplishes their other political goal as well: crushing anyone who isn’t in the 0.001%.
This is why Roger Simon was bleating today – as a member of the 1%, he isn’t rich enough to avoid economic pain that will barely sting the Kochs. Like all his kind, he thought he was permanently in the rich guy club, and is starting to wonder if perhaps he’s expendable; the Koch-types are only loyal to their subset, and the Simons have always been expendable.
PopeRatzo
The shutdown will end this Friday, when President Obama agrees to delay Obamacare for a year and take out the contraception mandate.
Because Obama cares if the country and the economy fall apart and the Republicans just don’t. i don’t see any roadmap for it ending any other way because we are dealing with radical nihilists on the Right who would see everything burn just so that it happens while Obama is president.
John Dillinger
The weather is too nice to give us feds too much time off. Shutdown of no more than two days now, more come winter time.
Gopher2B
@StringOnAStick:
“If they did, they would have yanked the congressional choke chain long before today, and yet they didn’t.”
If you knew that a debt default would scare the market down 5-10% and had the power to stave it off at the last second, why would you stop it early, and cut off an opportunity to buy a panic sell-off? This thing is going to the last possible minute.
mclaren
@Southern Beale:
It’s my understanding that Obama is intent on ending this craziness once and for all. Everyone recognizes you can’t run a government this way. Constant hostage-taking and continual threats to default and/or shut down the government every year, year after year after year after year, just aren’t practical for a real government in the real world.
cs
The shutdown will end 24 hours before the debt default. Obama will mint a Trillion dollar coin, or make an executive order based on a strict reading of the 14th amendment and based on the long-standing precedent of “better to ask forgiveness than permission.”
Republicans will completely go apeshit and the House will pass articles of impeachment. Obama and his people will frame this as: “What? You’re going to prosecute me for saving the country from certain doom? You’re mad because you weren’t allowed to destroy the country? Please, continue.”
Democrats will do much better in the mid-terms than expected though will still have to face a Republican house since gerrymandering has created several impermeable asylums. And then Christie narrowly wins a tight battle against Clinton in ’16 because Americans can’t remember much beyond yesterday and the day before that.
bcinaz
Oct 3, 2013 at 12:00pm. 50 hours after the exchanges open and uninsured Americans realize the actual Affordable Care Act.
Quaker in a Basement
Does anyone have “The day they chuck Boehner out a window”?
Cain
@KG:
No dude, Oregon, Washington, Northern California and British Columbia form their own country – Cascadia. You’ll have to drive through the haze of pot smoke in order to reach any of the main cities.
So Cal will be taken over by Red staters, and will join with Mexico and spread their disease to Mexico turning it to a retirement community but iwth better drugs.
Cain
@PopeRatzo:
If Obama does that he will be forever fucked. There will use that same thing over and over again, and ACA will never be implemented and morever they will ask for even more in the next year. Obama was right that these guys are just like terrorists and it would set a horrible precedent to cave. This is not something to be used as a bargaining chip.
Bob's Had Enough
What mclaren said. And, yes, I am sitting down.
It’s a good time to end this foolishness. The economy is somewhat recovered. The stock markets are in great shape. Our foreign war involvement about over. We’ve got some real chance to make gains in the Middle East with Iran opening up and giving us leverage with Israel.
Time to send in the swat team and whack the hostage takers for once and all.
Small pain now. Avoid the cumulative pain of letting this happen over and over and over.
Ksmiami
@MattF: yeah obama has planned something to prevent default… F:/;4 this [email protected]&
ruemara
@Cacti: A key thing I have never forgotten.
Redshift
@Zifnab25:
Let’s try to keep this remotely plausible. “become a set of warring techno-city-states” I could buy, but full cooperation? There are limits to my suspension of disbelief.
Wyrm1
Thursday October 18, say 3 O’Clock PM
mai naem(mobile)
I was going to say 10/16 but too many people thinking along the same lines. So, I say 10/14 because its at least one pay cycle and the wack job teabagger ted Cruz followers will notice the difference in their paychecks by 10/11 but won’t be able to do anything till 10/14.
Mary in Ohio
10/10/13. Just because.
Kayla Rudbek
October 29 11:59 pm when the Patent Office runs out of money and IBM, Apple, Microsoft, and the medicine companies decide enough is enough….
pattonbt
Dead thread (and now past the deadline and the Gov’mint officialy is shut down), but oh well…
The Crazy R’s will hold on to this just long enough to make splash but before real pain sets in or, more accurately, real light and blame gets shifted on them. So I’ll say midday Thursday.
The crazy R’s will give in this time because the debt limit is right around the corner and they want that fight too, so they will believe they won’t get too bruised on this one and really go for it on the debt limit. They will try and play the “see we tried, and look at what we faced. But next time, since it’s our last chance to pull a stunt like this and take hostages for the foreseeable future, we’ll go full bore”.
The biggest outcome of all this will be the death of the Hastert Rule.