U.S. Government shuts down.

[Chesspiece_face]

Then again... you might expect people with hard line beliefs on spending to be hard lined on spending. They ran their entire campaign on killing Obamacare, got elected by the 48% of people who think likewise, and they tried 50 times. Now they shut down the government because of it, even if it means they tick off the other 48% of people who like government.

We are a bi-polar nation. We are split almost equally between those who want more government, and those who want less government. Half of us are angry, and the other half are cheering (mostly because they didn't blink again).

Not exactly a true to life representation of this issue. You can't substitute "people that voted for Romney" with "people that want to get rid of government". And it shows as the news keeps rolling in about what is happening in DC right now. If a 'clean' bill were put up in the house it has a good chance that it would pass and this would be all over. What we have is a small minority of the political body taking all the leverage that they can and not caring what damage might come from it.

You can't even make the claim that the Republican caucus in the house is representative of an accurate proportion of the population as in most of the country the districts that they hold have been gerrymandered so completely that despite getting equal or less votes in a given state they still walk away with upwards of 3 times the seats as Democrats. So not only is it a minority mentality, but it's a minority mentality that is magnified massively in this one section of the political body.

Also, while I am at it, this idea of someone being for "small government" is pure political maneuvering and shouldn't be relied on in serious debates. It's like claiming that someone is for "common-sense solutions". It's a statement that purposefully lacks any context or specificity so that the audience can input whatever their personal concept of the issue is without ever holding the politician to any standard. It's a device that only works to inflame inherent personal ideologies and in the same stroke implies that whomever your opponent they are anti-everything. I'm for common-sense solutions! Thus my opponent must be for insipid wastefulness! I'm for small government! My opponent must be for government that wants to take your guns/religion/freedom/whatever the audiences cause de jour may be.