I can see now the head of the National Park Service – John Jarvis – is more than happy to confiscate the public’s national treasures and honored dead for political purposes. His excuses fly in the face of common sense, common decency, public stewardship and fiscally responsible spending.

And if this arrogant prince in Barry’s Court is going to stay the course, then the only answer beyond a Congressional investigation is to take the guy to court. Because while the head of the NPS can hide behind red tape and process with Congress, in a court with an independent-minded judge, his political arrogance won’t play well so well and he will be more personally exposed.

Look at what this idiot closed off – PLAYGROUNDS!

Capitol Hill playgrounds

One of the best things about Capitol Hill is the plethora of parks, most of which contain playground equipment. But these outdoor spaces, including Lincoln Park, Stanton Park, Garfield Park and Marion Park [shown below; AJStrata], are maintained by the National Park Service, which means that the toddler-friendly play spaces have been padlocked shut, leaving families out in the cold.

Can you believe it? This Scrooge actually stole fun from neighborhood kids! This is “good” government at work?

Do government death panels now sound so impossible now? I mean, even Harry Reid admitted he could care less about 1 kid with cancer when there are 1400 people sitting idle someplace in New Mexico! Of course, Harry should know furloughs are not terminal diseases – but he. Does. Not. Care! He is obsessed with the evil “Tea Party!” (cue the dramatic music) and having to give in to them one inch.

It is costing much more to protect Tot Lots from toddlers than to just leave them open and un-patrolled (and no, trash collecting and lawn mowing is not ‘patrolling’).

Which apparently brings us to the lame-ass excuse John Jarvis, Head of NPS, is using to excuse his inexcusable actions:

“There were the same number of park police along the National Mall when it was open last week as there are now when it is closed,” Hastings wrote. “In fact, on Tuesday, when barricades were first erected and areas closed down, there were even more police than on a typical day when it is open.

…

“Congressman Hastings is incorrect in that regard,” director Jarvis fired back on C-SPAN this morning. “We run a 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week, 365-day-a-year operation on the National Mall. Under normal circumstances, I would have 300 employees working on the National Mall and I currently have seven.”

That there are the same number of U.S. Park Police on the National Mall now as before the shutdown began is true, according to the U.S. Park Police officers’ union.

…

My understanding is that one of the reasons these areas are closed is because maintenance people aren’t  going to be there, [park rangers] aren’t going to be there to give information about these areas,” Officer Ian Glick said. “Maintenance also deals with trash pickup. The memorials will become very messy. We’ve had people slip and fall because they don’t know where the wheelchair ramps are. Park rangers generally direct them.”

…

We get tons of trash. Lots of trash. If it’s not picked up, it will invite rats.”

Good Lord, my 14 year old can concoct better alibis than this!

First off, trash collection must continue under the shutdown – BECAUSE funding for safety and protection of land is allowed. And there is nothing safe about rotting trash. If Jarvis is saying he stopped trash collection and instead bought thousands of Barrycades and put them up, he should be fired. And I suspect he will be fired.

Moreover, I seriously doubt those park rangers on The Mall monitor the playgrounds tucked away in neighborhoods. So this excuse is pure BS when it comes to the Tot Lots.

Just for barricading playgrounds John Jarvix should be removed from his job and his sanity assessed. He has some serious issues.

Time to put the squeeze on this guy and teach a lesson. Haul him into court AND in front of Congress.

Update: We need a lot more of this kind of civil disobedience at the National Monuments:

Tags: Barrycades, Shutdown Theater

Tide turner as Congress issues order to National Park Service to retain all records to Barrycading of America’s public treasures:

Senior Republicans on the House Natural Resources Committee sent a letter Wednesday to National Park Service Director Jonathan Jarvis asking him to retain all documents related to the “arbitrary” closures of open-air monuments and parks in the nation’s capital.

The committee is considering hearings to determine whether the Obama administration ordered the “outrageous” closures in an attempt to “make the current lapse in appropriations as conspicuous and painful to the public as possible,” according to the letter from chairman Doc Hastings, R-Wash., and subcommittee chairman Rob Bishop, R-Utah.

“The Park Service’s decision to barricade the open-air memorials from veterans and other Americans flies in the face of common sense, given their interest in visiting memorials that honor their service and sacrifice to the country,” the lawmakers wrote.

As I noted in my previous post, the paper trail here has to be huge (or would be fraudulent use of funds meant for other purposes).

There will be massive paper trails. There will be meeting notes, expenditures (you think they had all those Barrycades on hand!), authorizations to purchase, charge codes, etc. There will be 100?s of people who were directed to lay out the Barrycades. There will be subcontracts, purchase orders, delivery receipts.

In essence, there will be all the tell tale signs of a premeditated, scripted effort to steal the public lands, our national monuments – and worst of all: our fallen heroes – for the President and Dems to hold hostage and use as pawns.

And if there is not a clear accounting for all this Theater – that would be fraud.

Damned if they did, Damned if they hid.

Update: Darrell Issa also acts:

Representative Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has sent a letter to the National Parks Service, demanding answers on why the outdoors memorials have been barricaded during the shutdown.

The letter was co-written by Goverment Operations subcommitee chair John Mica (R., Fla.).

“Our concerns are heightened due to NPS’s suspicious decisions during the lead-up to the sequester,” wrote Issa and Mica in the letter.  “This past spring the Committee uncovered evidence that NPS’s budgetary decisions were designed to intentionally cause the most disruption to the public in a time of reduced funding.”

“Specifically, the Committee received information that proposed budget adjustments submitted by an NPS official in the field to deal with sequestration impacts were rejected by NPS superiors in favor of cuts that would be more visible and disruptive,” add Issa and Mica.

Think low level and mid level NPS career employees will fall on their sword for this nonsense? Not likely

Tags: Barrycades, Shutdown Theater

Update: The news about commandeering the graves of our fallen heroes needs to get out and on the evening news!

Major Update: House directs NPS to retain all records on Barrycading America!

Well, if there was any doubt who’s shutdown this really is, and who is putting the screws to the American people, look no further than the fact His Imperialness – Barry I – has commandeered and his holding ransom our war dead all over the globe! He has taken our heroes away from us and will not give them back until His Petulancy gets his way!

Tourists travelling to Omaha Beach to pay their respects to the 9,387 military dead at the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial will find it closed, a victim of the U.S. government’s partial shutdown.

The site overlooking the D-Day invasion beaches is one of 24 U.S. military cemeteries overseas that have closed to visitors since Monday. Ten more cemeteries in in France, as well as others in various European countries as well as Mexico, Panama, Tunisia and the Philippines, will remain closed for the duration of the shutdown.

The cemeteries are maintained by the American Battle Monuments Commission, set up after the First World War. Nearly 125,000 U.S. servicemen and women are buried at its cemeteries, and an additional 94,000 are commemorated on tablets of the missing.

This is what happens when we lose our democracy to self imposed demi-gods.

But while Barry I plays the all-knowing, all-righteous, he forgets that Americans abhor self imposed demi-gods. And worse, there is a clear trail of evidence concerning the White House hand in the Barrycade escapades. This trail of arrogance is something that needs to be exposed and dealt with. Or else these national treasures will be used by political hacks to punish the masses whenever the masses get out of line with the powers that be.

Just look at the list of areas commandeered and shutdown to irritate the public. Places that do not require human supervision on a daily basis, places that are costing the Obama administration tons of money to Barrycade!

• The National Park Service erected barricades to shut down parking lots surrounding Mount Vernon despite the fact that the tourist destination is privately owned, another example of how the feds are deliberately worsening the government shut down.
• Numerous hiking and biking trails throughout the greater DC region, despite requiring zero immediate maintenance or patrols, have been closed down. Irate citizens are merely flouting the law and using them anyway.
• The NPS has stationed officers along the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal that runs 184 miles from Washington, D.C. to Cumberland, Maryland to make sure nobody uses the bike paths. It would have required less manpower to keep this trail open. The handles on all the well pumps have also been removed.
• The feds also shut down a tiny park in which children play on fake turtles, prompting angry mothers to remove the barriers, only to see them put back up. “The park is extremely small and sort of seems pointless to block off,” reports the Daily Caller.

A tot lot was Barrycaded? Seriously?

His Petulancy orchestrated quite a show here. Barrycades around tot lots and bike paths!

A few legal observations are in order

• The only expenditures during a shutdown are for protection of life and property – NOT political theater of the irritating kind. Thus guarding tot lots from toddlers is not an allowable expense.
• Why is the tot lot being guarded and cancer studies being de-funded? Did the same evil genius come up with both Acts of the Shutdown Theater? I see criminal malfeasance and abuse.
• With all these Barrycades going up, we can be sure there was a ton of pre shut down planning and purchasing. A lot of it. This was planned!

The last bullet is Obama’s biggest mistake. This level of Theater requires lots of logistics and planning to pull off over night. Obama naively assumed the blockades would be blamed on the GOP in Congress, and no one would realize they are an unauthorized expense issued by the Executive branch. Obama is relying on the ignorance of the American people – who rarely appreciate the separations of powers regarding the funding/oversight of Congress and the administration/execution of the Executive Branch.

And of course Obama plans on the News Media to continue the lie for him, failing in their responsibility to report truthfully and accurately. Any journalist who does not point out the separation between funding and execution, and put the Barrycades on the shoulders of the Executive Branch were it belongs, is a charlatan to their trade.

But I digress. The OMB was identified as the brains behind the WWII Memorial Debacle, so they are probably the first place to investigate for all the Shutdown Theater idiocy. They were command center – the conductor if you will.

There will be massive paper trails. There will be meeting notes, expenditures (you think they had all those Barrycades on hand!), authorizations to purchase, charge codes, etc. There will be 100’s of people who were directed to lay out the Barrycades. There will be subcontracts, purchase orders, delivery receipts.

In essence, there will be all the tell tale signs of a premeditated, scripted effort to steal the public lands, our national monuments – and worst of all: our fallen heroes – for the President and Dems to hold hostage and use as pawns.

And if there is not a clear accounting for all this Theater – that would be fraud.

It is time the GOP began investigating because it is all there, with 100’s of people involved.

Tags: Barrycades, Shutdown Theater

My father is a World War II Vet. He enlisted in the Navy when he was 17 – before the war started and knowing it was coming. He first  served on the USS Texas in the North Atlantic.

Then served on the USS Cleveland from its first deployment at the invasion of Africa to its bruising battles in the South Pacific. The links tell the stories of these great ships and their crews.

His generation finished building this country into a world leader for freedom from oppression. His own father joined up once America was in the war, and he lost an uncle in the forests of the Ardennes in World War I. Needless to say, he and his family have sacrificed for this nation.

He was a simple man from the mountains of West Virginia, but he stands head and shoulders over many of the people now running this country in DC – running it into the ground.

When I think of the WWII vets who had to break through Barrycades to visit their own national monument it makes me ill. This nation’s politics should never overshadow the WWII veterans and  – even more so – the WWII casualties. Never.

The Shutdown Theater may be open right now, but as with all theater some subjects should be off limits. And this is one of them.

The Dems tried to play games with the shutdown and figuratively tried to spit in the face of the greatest American generation of all time. They tried to spit in my Dad’s face. And they tried to spit on the graves of all those who died saving the world from Hitler and Mussolini. That memorial in DC is not just for the vets that are alive today, it is also for all those buried around the world who died in the hell that was WWII [the above picture is the US graves at Omaha Beach, France]. These are the people who stopped the Holocaust and freed the surviving Jews. They deserved better than being pawns in a B-level political skit.

The more I think about what happened in DC yesterday and today, the more I realize the left has never grown up since the 1970’s and the ways they treated soldiers back then. Their political theater was pathetic:

The Obama Administration has decided to block access to public memorials on the National Mall as a result of the government shutdown. Like its decision to end White House tours when the sequester cuts took effect, there is no rational reason for this. The Park Police, nominally in charge of monitoring these spaces, isn’t even effected by the shutdown. Shutting off access to these sites is gratuitous and petulant.

They are pathetic.

Tags: Barrycades, Shutdown Theater

Barrycades popping up everywhere – even where they should not be!

Apparently the National Park Service has closed down a park in McLean, VA it does not operate:

Pointing to Park Service claims that parks have to be closed because the agency can’t afford staff during the government closure, Eberly wrote: “What utter crap. We have operated the Farm successfully for 32 years after the NPS cut the Farm from its budget in 1980 and are fully staffed and prepared to open today. But there are barricades at the Pavilions and entrance to the Farm. And if you were to park on the grass and visit on your own, you run the risk of being arrested. Of course, that will cost the NPS staff salaries to police the Farm against intruders while leaving it open will cost them nothing.”

Hat Tip Ed Morrissey.

Basically, the NPS has commandeered a park to close.

More madness – I hear rumors the overlooks on George Washington Parkway are also closed. Why? They are just places to pull over, park and admire the Potomac River?

Why is Obama wasting tax payer money on Barrycades like this?

Update: Confirmed, parking spaces on the GW parkway have been ‘shutdown’ with Barrycades.

Tags: Barrycades, Shutdown Theater

Final Update: Obama admin surrenders on the WWII Memorial (at least to WWII Vets). Now onto the Lincoln Memorial. Take back our country, one monument at a time.

Update: WWII vets – along with bipartisan congressional support – tear down Obama’s wall Went right through the “Barrycades”!. Follow on twitter

Best Tweet:

So the #WWIIMemorial is closed because they don’t have staff in place. But there’s staff in place to tell us it’s closed. #ShutdownTheater

— CamEdwards (@CamEdwards) October 2, 2013

Update: WWII Memorial now called “Shutdown Central” – and is bringing in bipartisan opposition to the “Barrycades”:

Veterans and volunteers from trips dubbed honor flights coming to D.C. today plan on moving barricades to get into the World War II memorial, volunteers said Tuesday morning. They are expected to be joined by lawmakers including Sen. Claire McCaskill (D., Mo.) and Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.). On Twitter, other lawmakers noted that they were at the memorial too.

Yeah, this is working really well for Reid and Obama. I think this shutdown is on its last legs. Politically this is a disaster.

Update: You can tell when a moment has been reached that turns the tide. When momentum shifts and fate pushes one side ahead and the other behind. This morning, the battle of the “National” Monuments feels like one of those pivotal moments. Below I linked to a comment made by Rep Rand Paul about the idiocy of closing off monuments that are normally wide open. It was a crisp assessment of what is happening down on the “National” Mall.

We now see the Obama administration holding hostage all The People’s property on the mall – for political theater. Well, this little skit is going to backfire – big time. Because this is now the image of The Shutdown:

Hat Tip Legal Insurrection. These monuments have NEVER been closed off to the public during any prior shutdowns. This is an Obama move. Why are we paying for these barricades? Are these essential services? Of course not!

Obama and Reid better start thinking hard about how to surrender quickly. Because they have set themselves up for protests and outrage like we have not seen before. In one picture, we see the oppressive nature of Democrat-run government (not “Democracy”, Democrat Party). Amazingly stupid move… – end update

Obama and the Democrats are clearly trying to make a stink with their shutdown gambit. But it is coming off more as petty arrogance instead of principled actions.

One of the worst examples is the “closing” of the World War II memorial down on the “National” Mall. An area of public land that is NOT owned by the Democrats – no matter what they want to think. No party owns this land and its monuments, the American People do.

What you have to realize about the monument is it is completely open air. It is basically side walks and a fountain area. There is no entrance, any more than there is an entrance to a city square with fountain or monument in the middle [click to enlarge]:

So why go through the expense and effort to put up barriers – except to create political theater of the petulant kind!

I can see closing the information center which stands nearby. Close the bathrooms – fair enough. But why put up barriers and then pay police to keep Americans out of the memorial THEY PAID FOR with blood and treasure?

Yesterday there was a confrontation at the memorial involving WWII vets who flew in to see the national memorial to their efforts. What happened is a clear indication of the stupidity and arrogance of DC right now:

Busloads of World War II veterans, many in wheelchairs, broke past a barricade Tuesday morning to cross into the World War II Memorial, as onlookers applauded and a man playing the bagpipes led the way. Moments earlier, a few Republican members of Congress had removed a section of the black gates that surrounded the site, allowing a line of veterans to roll past security officers, who willingly stood aside.

…

The National Park Service closed all of its parks, including national memorials, as a result of the federal government shutdown that went into effect at 12:01 a.m ET.

But a spokeswoman from the National Mall and Parks Service said efforts were no longer being made to hold anyone back.

“These are important visitors,” Carol Johnson told reporters, adding that they’re seeking guidance from the director’s office on “where we go next.”

…

Some Republican members of Congress and a Democratic senator were on site, blasting the federal government for fencing off the memorial. Outraged and baffled, Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, crossed through an opening in the railing earlier in the morning–before the breach–and got on the phone to try and reach the secretary of the Department of Interior.

“I don’t get it. I’m furious. I’m trying to get a hold of people,” he said, standing on the other side of the barricade and looking around for help. “But I can’t seem to get a hold of anybody.”

Whoever thought this lunacy up should be fined the cost incurred. It is a dumb waste of money pure and simple.

And of course the news media is involved in the political theater of the absurd up to their eyeballs. Wailing about the unfairness of the GOP – who are duly elected representatives of the American people. A significant number of which don’t support the Democrats or their policies. Will they report on this side of the shutdown – Democrat idiocy?

Will they report on the citizen revolt rising up:

After a group of veterans broke down the barricades at the national World War II Memorial Tuesday afternoon, organizers of one Hero Flight Network group told BuzzFeed it wasn’t the last Washington would hear from them. Veterans are plotting another protest at the same place Wednesday, and expressed interest in staging similar events at sites across the nation’s capital, including the Lincoln Memorial — an act of civil disobedience that would likely pour fuel on the already highly flammable politics of the government shutdown.

“We have people here that are 80 and 90 years old and they closed down all the bathrooms?” said Tony Nussbaum, a 25-year veteran of the Air Force from Iowa and a leader of the state’s Hero Flight group. “I’m about to just start pissing on the trees.”

BTW, the Lincoln Memorial – while in a building – is also open. There is no need to restrict access to it.

The shutdown is now on and the Libertarian/GOP side of the argument has yet to really get motivated. What will it look like for the Greatest Generation to be protesting the Obama administration? Think that could be some powerful political theater?

But more importantly, the GOP has to gain something for the price they will pay for their part in the shutdown. Dems who think they can force the GOP to retreat from their principled positions are kidding themselves. The Dems are not looking all that smart either, voting to not negotiate, voting against funding parts of the government there are no issues over (like the Park Service). They will also pay a price next year.

The GOP just has to keep sending reasonable bills to the Senate for the Dems vote down. That will chew away at their petulance and arrogance.

Update: Well, well – I may be wrong about the news media:

The WWII Memorial will be re-closed this afternoon and remain closed until funding is restored. National Mall and Memorial Parks Communications Officer Carol Johnson told ABC News the memorial will be shut down and cleared by Park Police.

More here.

And here:

Some idiot in government sent goons out there to set up barricades, so they couldn’t see the monument. People had to spend hours setting up barricades where there are never barricades to prevent people from seeing the World War II monument because they’re trying to play a charade,” Rand (R-Ky.) said Tuesday on Fox News’s “Hannity.”

I guess its the government verses the citizens.  We now have a rallying point. Bring it on!

Tags: Barrycades, Shutdown Theater

The greater DC area is pretty immune to economic down turns. We who are fortunate to bask in the light of the all-knowing (sarcasm on full) are protected against the foolishness of DC’s policy mistakes the rest of the nation suffers.

Ed Morrissey notes an enlightening Washington Post article that points this out in spades, and also highlights the Achilles’ Heel of Democrat hopes “The Shut Down” is going to be blamed on the GOP – or even seen as bad thing outside the bubble of the beltway:

Washington, a company town unlike any other in America, was on the verge of grinding to a standstill late Monday. And with the factory about to be shuttered, here’s what the dawn could bring: More than 700,000 federal workers idled in and around the District; battalions of frustrated tourists locked out of museums; rush-hour commutes that feel like Sunday morning and countless worried merchants wringing their hands.

The Capital of the Free World: Closed till further notice.

Immune from the worst of a recession that battered the rest of the nation in recent years, U.S. government employees in this U.S. government town know they’ll be disproportionately impacted if nonessential federal offices and programs are shut down at midnight in the spending impasse between Congress and the White House.

So how is it the rest of the nation is going to feel pity and angst for all those government workers and politicians who brought us years and years of economic madness? I am not saying Americans are cruel, but many will be thinking “now you know how it feels, and maybe now you will think before you throw crap on Main Street”

Worse yet, what happens if “The Shut Down” goes the way of the Sequestration Cuts? Most people are completely unaware Sequestrations is still in effect. Yet the sky did not fall as the Chicken Little Left predicted!Will American notice?

There have been 17 shut downs since 1976. How many times can you cry “Wolf!” before Main Street stops reacting?

And it gets worse yet for the Democrats. Their line in the sand is the very unpopular Obamacare. A government solution that is set to wipe out a health care system 85% of Americans liked and supported:

In the US before passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, 85% of Americans had existing health-care coverage — and 87% were happy with it.  In fact, half of the uninsured were happy with their health care.  Overhauling the system that satisfied 85% of Americans in order to do something with half of the 15% unhappy with their situation only made sense if the 85% could be assured that their situation would remain the same. Of course, that was nonsense all along.

Too bad the AP couldn’t have done more fact-checking along those lines before now.

Hat Tip Reader Frogg1

Flip this data around and it means 85% of the people who were happy have the potential to be really unhappy with the dawn of Obamacare! I know I am so far – premiums are skyrocketing. Not to mention what Obamacare is doing to the nature of jobs overall – making us a nation of part time employed:

But what really shows what is going on in America at least in 2013, is the following summary: of the 953K jobs “created” so far in 2013, only 23%, or 222K, were full-time. Part-time jobs? 731K of the 953K total.

Emphasis in original. More here (from the UK media since the US media is in full CYA mode):

US employers slashing worker hours to avoid Obamacare insurance mandate

Trend sparks fears among low-paid workers that they will be hit twice: by having earnings cut and paying more for healthcare

So we have a shutdown that finally brings the fruits (rotten as they are) of liberal economics home to the inside the beltway crowd, which I would wager will be greeted by the rest of Americans with a huge shrug of “join the crowd“. The gems of the government will be shut down (museums, parks, etc), but Obamacare will be the one federal program sitting high – like a beacon.

Or will it be more like a lightening rod for the years of economic frustration that have been brewing over the last 5 years or so? Only time will tell.

Update: This comment over at Hot Air sums up the realistic response nicely:

Let the Hunger Games begin.

faraway on October 1, 2013 at 9:34 AM

Tags: Barrycades, Shutdown Theater

I had to laugh at the Senator from Maryland’s outlandish comment on the shutdown:

Can you believe this?” said Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), the chairwoman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. “We are the United States of America. We are a superpower. We’re supposed to be a nation governed by rule of law and we’re about to shut down.”

This nonsense was quoted after the new article dropped this bombshell:

Senators defeated the House proposal along party lines, 54-46 There were no defections. The measure would have delayed the individual mandate, a core piece of the Affordable Care Act, and prevented congressional lawmakers and staff from receiving federal subsidies when they enter healthcare exchanges.

So, the outraged senator voted to keep her Obamacare subsidy, even though she is quite well paid. Sadly for those of us who work for the government in one capacity or the other, we won’t be getting paid, let alone lining our pockets.

The US Senate under Democrat control is a sad, pathetic joke. It has failed to pass budgets for years, only to puke at a partial one this last spring, covering only part of the year:

The Senate early Saturday passed its first budget in four years by a vote of 50 to 49.

…

Democrats had been dogged by criticism for failing to approve a budget resolution since 2009 and the vote removes that GOP talking point from the political scene.

Americans need to remember the House sent bills to keep the government open. It was the Dems who held the government hostage to save one dumb program – Obamacare. The nation needs a wake up call, and this morning it got it.

The GOP never should have made the call. I don’t care if they were bluffing, they are all in now. There is no choice – shut it down or surrender.

Shut it down – and watch as nothing happens. I mean nothing. It is just like Sequestration and the Stimulus billl – all smoke and mirrors.

Military pay is covered (unless Obama is stupid enough to veto). Essential services like food stamps, medicare, etc are exempt.

Heck, 90% of government contractors will work “offsite” via telework.

Shut it down. And watch as nothing happens. The Chicken Littles will be called out.

There is no emergency – and without Government Fiscal Year 2014 funding Obamacare is dead on arrival.  No funds, no roll out.

Checkmate.

The liberal media seems to be pulling out all the stops (and exposing their inherent bias) to save Democrats from blame if there is a government shutdown.

Tomorrow, the AP will cover the current spending standoff in an article that will appear across the country, likely in whatever newspaper you read. The AP’s piece, by Andrew Taylor, begins:

With the government teetering on the brink of partial shutdown, congressional Republicans vowed Sunday to keep using an otherwise routine federal funding bill to try to attack the president’s health care law.

There you have it! Our government is “teetering,” but those dastardly Republicans have “vowed” to use an “otherwise routine” spending bill to “try to attack” Obamacare.

Well, that might work if the press had any respect with the American public. But neither Obamacare nor the News Media are in good standing with the citizens of this great country at the moment.  The News Media is hovering around its worse, historic standing ever – a new low measured just last month:

Worse yet, in the demographics Democrats need to rally to the media is not popular at all:

Obamacare is still not seeing majority support (update: Hot Air identified the latest Obamacare poll), and when it rolls out tomorrow and people see all the promises broken – the fact they will lose their current plans AND pay more – the news media will be seen as the political shill it is. Which will only cement their current reputation with the people.

I say let it play out. The Dems and Media are bluffing on who will get the blame. And the GOP should do what is right, not what is popular.