So… government shutdown, anybody?
A government shutdown isn’t a very big deal. That’s why Democrats feel like risking it over one (non-budget) issue. I’m mostly put off by the media’s disparate treatment of Democrats threatening shutdown compared to the Republicans in 2013.
Very much agreed. In 2013, the Republicans held the House and the Democrats held the Senate (albeit with the Republicans having filibuster power, so some degree of Republican buy-in was needed there, too), so the 2013 shutdown could be fairly characterized as a failure of the parties to compromise (blame may not be apportioned equally, but still). The media gave all the blame to the Republicans.
But today, the Democrats don’t have the power to shut anything down (the filibuster is dead and gone), all they can do is not bail the Republicans out when the Republicans shut down the government, but the media is very much treating it like the Democratic Party has the final say in the matter. “Elections have consequences” cuts both ways, and doubly so after you throw out the filibuster – when you control every branch of the Federal government and a huge majority of the state governments as well, blaming the other party is never going to sound exactly credible. But the media’s still carrying that water.