SHUTDOWN COUNTDOWN: 17 HOURS -- NO NEGOTIATIONS as government hurtles toward shutdown

[bsteadman]

SHUTDOWN COUNTDOWN: 17 HOURS -- NO NEGOTIATIONS as government hurtles toward shutdown -- AT REID'S URGING, Obama scraps photo opp with leaders -- KEVIN SPACEY had a life lesson for YOU

Politico
Mike Allen
9/30/2013

Excerpt:

EMAIL DU JOUR: A tippy-top Democratic official tells us the reason that President Obama and Senate Democrats WILL NOT stave off a shutdown by caving to House GOP: “Time to punch the bully in his nose.” - (bold, underline and color emphasis added)

--STEVE RATTNER, on “Morning Joe”: “The shutdown is essentially inevitable.”

--CNN/ORC POLL out this a.m.: “If the federal government shuts down, do you think that Barack Obama or the Republicans in Congress would be more responsible for that?” Republicans in Congress, 46% … Obama, 36% … Both (volunteered), 13%

PUNDIT PREP -- PERILOUS MOMENT FOR BOEHNER – Jake Sherman and John Bresnahan: “Despite his backroom pleas and carefully crafted strategies, [Speaker] Boehner — a veteran of the shutdown battles of the mid-1990s — was unable to convince a hard-line faction of House GOP lawmakers that they should save their legislative brawls for the debt ceiling fight, where Boehner thought he could drag President Barack Obama to the negotiating table. Unless there is a last-minute deal, the U.S. government will shut down [tonight] at midnight, immediately furloughing hundreds of thousands of federal workers. The vast majority of public and private polling shows that Boehner’s House Republicans will get blamed for the stalemate. Boehner and his top aides know it — after all, it was the speaker who privately warned his leadership team that this shutdown could cost him his majority.

“It’s a pivotal moment for Boehner, perhaps the biggest crisis of his speakership, and he’s heading into it with a weak hand. The best Boehner can hope for is a draw. At worst, he could be endangering his troubled 17-seat majority as well as his own hold on the speaker’s gavel. As of late Sunday, there were no negotiations occurring between Boehner, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Obama. The Senate wasn’t even in session, and House GOP leaders weren’t holding emergency discussions internally. Both sides seem prepared to let the government shutdown happen and then squabble over who is to blame.

“The House will reconvene … at 10 a.m., but Republicans will just wait. The Senate is scheduled to return Monday afternoon, and Reid says Senate Democrats will move quickly then to reject two House amendments to the government funding bill. … Boehner, who also faces in coming weeks an even more daunting battle with Obama and Reid over raising the $16.7 trillion debt ceiling, may need a shutdown now in order to reassert control over his members and cool their passion for a winner-takes-all showdown with Democrats.” http://goo.gl/VWdzJW

--REID TAKES LEAD -- Manu Raju and Burgess Everett: “Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has been the most ardent proponent of President Barack Obama taking a hard line with House Republicans … When the president considered sitting down with the four congressional leaders in the White House ahead of the deadline to avert a government shutdown, Reid privately urged Obama to call off the meeting … Reid believed that it would amount to nothing more than a photo-op that would give the false impression that a serious negotiation was occurring, even warning he wouldn’t attend such a session. Obama scrapped it.” http://goo.gl/fertOv

THE HEADLINES: N.Y. Times, top of col. 5, “Senate to Act At the Brink Of Shutdown: Chambers Blame Each Other for Impasse” … WSJ 5-col. lead, “Government Heads Toward Shutdown: With Deadline Looming Tonight, No Signs of Resolution” (A1 sidebar: “ANALYSIS: Obama and Ryan Stay on Sidelines” … USA Today banner (with pic of Capitol dome), “CLOSING TIME? Dems accused of ‘playing games’; GOP of being ‘reckless’” … WashPost 2-col. lead, “On brink of shutdown, all quiet at Capitol: WAITING GAME BEFORE DEADLINE DAY -- Republican whip predicts new House measure.”

--WashPost A1, “THE REGION: ‘Tsunami’ would hit jobs, safety net,” by Brigid Schulte and Justin Jouvenal: “The Washington region, home to the largest concentration of federal workers and contractors in the nation, could lose an estimated $200 million a day and could see more than 700,000 jobs take a financial hit if the federal government shuts down Monday night, according to a local economist’s projections. And that’s not counting the blow to tourism … if the Smithsonian museums, the National Zoo, Civil War battlefields and other federally funded attractions are shuttered, said Stephen Fuller, director of George Mason University’s Center for Regional Analysis. … [R]esidents could also see cuts in federal services: no new applications for benefits such as Medicare, Social Security and child-care subsidies, no new housing or small-business loans, no new clinical trials for research funded by the National Institutes of Health …

“Child-care centers in federal agencies would close, parents said, and child-care workers, who are not employed by the federal government, likewise would be sent home. … And while the District is the only jurisdiction that could have basic services — such as trash pickup and libraries — halted, Mayor Vincent C. Gray (D) is attempting to avoid that by declaring every city employee essential … Fuller … projected that 60 percent of the area’s 377,000 federal workers would be deemed ‘nonessential’ and would stay home. Likewise, he projected that the shutdown would affect about 20 percent of the government’s contractors.” http://goo.gl/3VGCJw

SHUTDOWN PROGRAMMING: Bloomberg TV’s Trish Regan anchors “Countdown to the Shutdown” editions of the market open and close programs, live from Capitol Hill (8 to 10 a.m. and 3-5 p.m.). Joining Regan on-set: Bloomberg TV contributor David Plouffe, Bloomberg TV political strategist Matthew Dowd, Bloomberg View columnist Al Hunt, White House correspondent Julianna Goldman, chief Washington correspondent Peter Cook and Bloomberg News reporter Phil Mattingly. Other guests: Sen. John McCain, Honeywell CEO Dave Cote, Grover Norquist, former Sen. John Sununu, Rep. Chris Van Hollen, former Comptroller General David Walker,. David Stockman and Douglas Holtz-Eakin. Livestream www.bloomberg.com/tv

DRVING THE WHITE HOUSE DAY – Affordable Care Act Update: “Today, the White House will launch a new animated graphic that explains how much easier applying for health insurance will be on the new Marketplaces, where consumers will be able to sign up using an easy-to-understand, three page form – that is significantly shorter and less confusing than application forms today. The Vice President has penned a series of op-eds designed to directly reach young Americans and states with high pockets of uninsured Americans … [The op-eds] break down the benefits of the law in plain English, and separate health care facts from fiction …
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View the complete article at:

http://www.politico.com/playbook/

[bsteadman]

Politico to Media: Ignore ObamaCare Launch Problems

Breitbart / Big-Journalism
John Nolte
9/28/2013

Excerpt:

If you thought the left-wing Politico's Friday lead piece taunting the GOP to shut down the government was a knee-slapper, you should read what is leading today: "Can the media avoid rush judgment on Obamacare?" Essentially what you have here is an outlet that likes to present itself as objective, begging its media colleagues not to report on any problems the American people might have with Tuesday's ObamaCare launch. This, despite the fact that the White House has already admitted there will be "glitches."

Again, because Politico is always trying to fool people into believing it is an objective news outlet, the piece also warns the media not to declare ObamaCare a "success" based on the first few days. But if you want to suffer through reading one of Politico's typically overlong articles, it is clear that, on behalf of the White House, Politico is pleading/warning the media that reporting on any frustrations the American people might have with ObamaCare is not real reporting:

When Obamacare enrollment begins on Tuesday, reporters in the Twitter age will be tempted to declare the health law a success or a failure in the first few days — a judgment that will certainly be stoked by advocates on both sides of the issue.

And any rush judgments could have a big impact on public opinion of the law. Right now, the majority of Americans in recent polls say they oppose the law, but the Obama administration is hoping that will turn around once people see it in action.

The first days of enrollment are a chance for that to happen — but there’s just as big a chance that the public could become convinced it’s a huge disaster, if technical breakdowns in the new health insurance exchanges dominate the news.

It has been extraordinary to watch the media this week as they completely shifted their long-held values. For decades, the media held no higher political value than the idea of bipartisan civility and compromise. This week, though, it is perfectly okay with the media for Obama to risk a government shutdown by saying he will not negotiate with house burners.

And now when it comes to ObamaCare, Politico, a media outlet that prides itself on being the ESPN/play-by-play of politics, no longer wants the mediato report on what is happening at the moment and in real time. Instead, this objective, unbiased, not-at-all-liberal news outlet wants that news downplayed or outright ignored in order to … give ObamaCare a chance.
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View the complete article at:

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journal...aunch-problems

[bsteadman]

Shutdown showdown hits brink as Senate kills House spending bill

The Washington Times
Stepen Dinan
9/30/2013

Excerpt:

The Senate voted Monday afternoon to kill House Republicans’ latest stopgap spending offer, holding firm in their demand that Congress continue to fund Obamacare as part of any government-funding debate.

The 54-46 vote officially tabled both proposals the House GOP passed early Sunday morning, one of which would have funded the government while delaying the health law for a year, and the other of which would have repealed one of the Affordable Care Act’s tax increases.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid bundled both of those proposals into a single vote, which made it easier to round up the support to kill them.

Now the measure returns to the House, where Republicans have said they are considering several options to keep the government open past midnight Monday while also making a dent in Obamacare. Earlier in the day Republicans complained that they weren’t getting the bill back from the Senate early enough.

“Senate decided not to work yesterday. Well my goodness, if there’s such an emergency, where are they?” Speaker John A. Boehner said as he opened Monday’s House session.

Some Republicans want the House to pass a new bill that would fund the government but also would require President Obama, Vice President Joseph R. Biden and all of the administration’s top political appointees to forgo their government health plans and join the health exchanges.
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View the complete article at:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...spending-bill/