Government shutdown: who will be responsible

Sorting through the dozens of stories on the politics of the impending federal government shutdown, two statements stick out in my mind.

First: Republican Rep. Mike Pence, Indiana, saying he favors shutting government down if Democrats, who hold half the power, don't agree to House demands.

From ABC news website:

On ABC’s “Top Line” today, Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., told us that if the only alternative is continuing spending at unsustainable levels, “then I say shut it down.”

“Nobody wants to shut down the federal government. But if we don't take decisive efforts to change the fiscal direction of this national government, we're going to shut down the future for our children and grandchildren, and that would be decidedly worse,” Pence said.

No. 2: House Speaker John Boehner telling CNN there's a real cost to shutdown. It costs more than keeping the government running, he said. Contracts have to be interrupted, services stopped.

Government workers still get paid.

Compromise argument:


Senate Democrats and Obama say they're the ones compromising. When they agreed to $10 billion in cuts and House Republicans put up $60 billion. Splitting the different would put the number at $35 billion, and so far, the latest has Democrats offering is like $33 billion to $40 billion.

Seems like meeting pretty much in the middle to me.

Rep. Michele Bachmann and others say though that the $60 billion is a compromise because they started at $100 billion. So that means they came down $40 billion. But Obama counters with an argument that has similar weight (not much), that he's giving up $74 billion already from his starting point in budget.

Finally, Democrats charge Republicans "keep moving the middle."

Well, it kind of seems like that's the case to me, but I haven't heard an argument from Republicans about why that isn't valid.

Boehner has been said to be advising his party in caucus that they do not want a government shutdown. He was there for the 1995 shutdown and remembers how the country blamed Republicans for several years.