Reducing the Shut-down to its simplest changable Element

[cthulu2016]

Overall situations are often more complicated than they appear.

Crises tend to be simpler than they appear.

For instance, there may be too much stuff in the refrigerator because not enough left-overs are eaten or thrown away, and the kids don't consolidate things and there's a twelve-pak box with only one Coke in it...

But what specific thing is preventing the refrigerator door from closing? Oh, it's the corner of that one square tupperware thing.


Why, in specific, is the government going to shut-down? What is the moving (or non-moving) part responsible?

There are two attractive answers.

First is that Boehner chose that result. Since he is one moving part the simplest fix would be for him to decide to bring the (already passed) Senate bill to a vote in the House where it has enough support to pass because enough Republicans (20,30...) would join Democrats on the vote. But though simple, this would require reversing Boehner's stance, and thus is hard to accomplish. He would probably lose his Speakership and will thus be all but impossible to move.

So in terms of a solution, the real reason for the shut down is, in my view, this:

There are 20 or 30 Republicans in the House who are willing, in cases even eager to cast a vote on a certain bill, in order to not shut down the government, but are not willing to sign a discharge petition to bring the bill to a vote. Even though they wish somebody would bring it to a vote so they could vote for it.

They are the specific blockade and thus this crisis will probably be resolved in their districts.

Step One to unclogging the problem: Challenge all of those Republicans on why they have not signed a discharge petition on the Senate bill.

I have heard several of these pro clean-bill Republicans interviewed and nobody is asking them whether they have signed a discharge petition in favor of the action (a vote on a clean bill) they are on TV to claim they support.

[Old Navy]

1. It's the Hastert rule, which should be permanently banned.

Stupid sheeples..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hastert_Rule

[cthulu2016]

2. Since it is not a rule, that reduces to "Boehner chooses to"

The Hastert rule is not codified anywhere, it is a rule of thumb for being a dick that Boehner chooses to employ, so there is nothing there to ban.

The rules that allow the House Speaker effective control of what comes to a vote (short of a discharge petition), however, could be changed which would have the effect of making the Hastert "rule" impossible to apply.