There were no signs from Congress or the White House of last-minute negotiations to resolve the standoff. Instead, Democrats and Republicans spent their energies trying to pin blame on the other side for failing to avoid a calamity.
If only there was some way to tell who was truly at fault.
Boehner and Reid have taken a low profile as the deadline draws closer, leaving on-camera appearances to deputies and often speaking through their press staffs.
Guess not then.
And if the battle over “Obamacare” pushes up to the mid-October deadline to raise the debt ceiling, U.S. stocks may suffer. When gridlock threatened a debt default in 2011, the Dow Jones industrials fell about 2,100 points from July 21 to August 9, with the market needing two more months to regain its footing.
“Gridlock” threatened stock prices. All by itself.
I hate gridlock! Someone repeal gridlock!
The last government shutdown ran from December 16, 1995, to January 6, 1996, and was the product of a budget battle between Democratic President Bill Clinton and Republicans, led by then-Speaker Newt Gingrich.
There’s that gridlock again. If only both sides would stop doing it.
A.