WASHINGTON DC – While members of Congress ended 2013 congratulating themselves for passing a budget, the media missed the fact that the agreement doesn’t actually avoid a government shutdown. The deal reached by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) provides simply a blueprint for government spending. Congress must still pass legislation detailing specific spending before January 15, when government’s spending authority expires. Government still faces a potential shutdown in a little over a week.
The budget agreement passed by Congress in the closing days of last year provides what is called the “top-Line” number, setting the overall level of discretionary spending. Congress still has to pass appropriations bills authorizing specific spending for thousands of government agencies, departments and programs. While there is agreement on the total amount of discretionary spending, there is far less agreement on how this spending is allocated. These agreements will have to be reached by the 15th, of the government would shut down again. (read more)
I am reminded of a previous conversation point we discussed in 2011.

Obama and the Magic Monkey Routine

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The 2010 and 2012 class of Tea Party House Congressional members have done an outstanding job of holding the line amid attacks from both Democrats and Republicans.  Can you just imagine what legislative life would be like without their fight?
Ted Cruz appears on ABC This Week and discusses his meeting with them during the shutdown.   Jonathan Karl is just aghast at their united patriotic perspectives.

The chatter amongst the Inside-the-Beltway C&CCS* set is the recent flare up in the barely simmering ideological flame war between the Establishment “Main Street Republican” Decepticons and grassroots Tea Party activists leading into the 2014 election cycle for the very soul and future direction of “Conservatism” in America.
In addition to not-so-subtle chats with martial industry lobbyists, at a fundraiser held in early November McConnell personally demanded Defense contractors pony up to stop the Tea Party assault or face a defense contract spending drought in the next Congress.

Sources close to the discussions state McConnell is looking for deep pockets to fund his “one issue” campaign to “teach” those who seek to primary “approved” Establishment Republicans a “lesson” as some type of ill conceived anodynic salve that will simultaneously heal the internecine rupture and rally the troops while affirmatively castigating the wayward “wild eyed” Tea Party patriots and extinguishing any lingering questions about his impoverished ability to lead fence sitting middle America into rallying behind a resurgent majority Republican Congress. Overall support from the defense industries has tapered significantly since the 2008 cycle, and McConnell is demanding they open the spigot – wide.

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“government shutdown”?   Oh, it’s only terrorism when the other side does it.
Paul Ryan and Patty Murray have been trying for weeks to come to a budget agreement.  They are talking and working but the sticking points are what they have always been.  Democrats want the sequester caps removed and spending increased.  
If Ryan and Murray can’t come to a deal Boehner has a backup plan to just advance the Continuing Resolution at current fiscal spending levels.  Senate Dems are FREAKING.
WASHINGTON DC – House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer would oppose a continuing resolution to keep government funded beyond Jan. 15 if it doesn’t address the sequestration cuts.
“I believe that hurts our national security, it hurts our economy and it undermines our responsibility of running government at a level that is productive for our people,” Hoyer said. (more…)

Chuck Schumer has lived up to his word.  He promised he would introduce a new bill in the Senate called the “McConnell Rule”.    The “rule” would grant the president, and subsequently the Treasury Secretary, unlimited capability to raise the debt ceiling as they needed.    Congress could only vote to STOP the debt ceiling from being raised, and it would take a super majority, 66 votes, (2/3rds) to block it.
Called the McConnell Rule because unbelievably it was the brainchild idea of Republican Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell.    
However, because McConnell is in a highly contested primary, Chuck Schumer and Barbara Boxer (yes you read that right) are sponsoring the measure on McConnell’s behalf.  They are calling it the “Pay Our Bills Act”.
WASHINGTON DC – Democratic senators have introduced legislation that would grant President Barack Obama, and subsequent presidents, the authority to increase the legal limit on the federal government’s debt unless Congress subsequently voted to disapprove the increase. (more…)

This was discussed on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday – With Senator Chuck Schumer announcing his intention to bring up this new fiscal rule.

Essentially, instead of Congress having to vote to raise the debt ceiling, the Executive Branch would have unlimited ability to raise it and Congress could only vote to *disapprove it*.   Meaning, a super-majority would be needed in the Senate (66 votes) to BLOCK the President from raising the debt ceiling.
It is called the “McConnell Rule” because, unbelievably, it was Republican Senator Mitch McConnell’s idea. Go figure.…
(Via National Review Online) Senator Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) is planning on introducing legislation containing Senator Mitch McConnell’s proposal to change the debt ceiling and weaken Congress’s power over it.

“One way to avoid this from happening again is for us to implement the McConnell rule, which says that Congress must disapprove rather than approve increases in the debt ceiling,” Schumer said on Meet the Press. “If we were to do that, the chances of going up to the brink again, the chances of this kind of debacle would decrease. I’m going to introduce legislation to do just that, and it would really help.”

….  The bestest part about this article, the group was ‘WOMEN’ !  You can almost hear the Trembling Democrat Splodey Head’s now.   L 😀 L
(TEXAS – Via Reuters) Republican U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, a favorite of the conservative Tea Party movement, returned home to a rousing welcome in Texas on Saturday after his attempt to derail Obamacare with a shutdown of the federal government led to sharp criticism of his tactics as reckless and futile.
“After two months in Washington, it’s great to be back in America,” Cruz joked in speaking to a crowd of about 750 people in a packed downtown San Antonio hotel ballroom.
Cruz was greeted with an eight-minute standing ovation in an appearance organized by the Texas Federation of Republican Women. People in attendance, many of them wearing red to show their support for keeping Texas a conservative-leaning state, lined up to greet him. (more…)

The Kentucky, Tennessee and South Carolina Tea party Tests are discussed toward the end:

UPDATE:  Be sure to read Andrea Shea King’s explanation in the comments section.

WASHINGTON DC – A proposal to end the government shutdown and avoid default orchestrated by Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and Democratic Leader Harry Reid includes a nearly $3 billion earmark for a Kentucky project.
Language in a draft of the McConnell-Reid deal (see page 13, section 123) provided to WFPL News shows a provision that increases funding for the massive Olmsted Dam Lock in Paducah, Ky., from $775 million to nearly $2.9 billion.
The dam is considered an important project for the state and region in regards to water traffic along the Ohio River.
As The Courier-Journal’s James Bruggers reported in 2011, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said they needed about $2.1 billion for the locks due to “stop and go funding.” (read more)

The Old and Busted politically dependent, self-serving corruptocrats

The New Principle-Centered Leaders !

We shall crawl naked over broken glass if needed, and do everything we can to defeat every single establishment Republican in the 2014 election.  Beginning with Mitch McConnell (Kentucky) and Lyndsey Graham (South Carolina).