Averting the End Of The World

I listened to a bit of The Diane Rehm Show on NPR this morning. I was on my way to the nutritionist on the west side of Ann Arbor and got too far away from my classical music station in Detroit. So I switched to the Ann Arbor NPR station. I found the transcript online, but didn't bother to read the whole thing -- they stayed on topic for an hour.

The topic, of course, was the gov't shutdown. What caught my interest was a comment by Molly Ball, staff writer for The Atlantic. It's at 10:26 in the transcript. She is referring to Tea Party Republicans.

So I don't think that they're really amenable to being swayed by the fact that people are upset about their vacations or the fact that people are missing a couple of paychecks because to them they are averting a disaster of world historical proportions in their attempt to stop Obamacare. Which, by the way, they are not doing, right, because as we've seen, the exchanges are opening anyway.

A bit later Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute adds:

[T]hey are united by and large on a strategy to hold out at least until the 17th. Then tie default to the government shutdown, believing that then they can up their demands and force Harry Reid and Barack Obama to accede to many of their...

He is interrupted at this point.

My summary: The Tea Party GOP believe allowing Obamacare to exist will cause an apocalyptic End Of The World. Yeah, we in the gay community have heard this before, that gay marriage will end Western Civilization and all that. I suppose, though, they are right -- it will mark the end of their world, the one in which straight white conservative males control everything so tightly there is no chance for those people to challenge their place at the top. And healthy poor people are the first step in that challenge.

So if the goal is to stop the End Of The World, shutting down the government, or even the entire economy, is a small price to pay. Which means this could be a long, drawn out battle ending in calamity.

The thought from an evening talk show (on NPR) was that the GOP has boxed itself into a corner and can't let go. They're going to look pathetic if they aren't able to extract some concession from the Dems, something worth all the hassle they've put everyone through.