Twas the Night Before Shutdown (complete)

Twas the night before shutdown: the House changed its rules
To hold us all hostage to vain spiteful fools.

Poison pills had been stuffed in the CR with care
To deprive shiftless "others" of Obamacare.

A Senate CR, disinfected and clean,
Was blocked from a vote by the rightwing machine.

And Boehner with his baritone, and Cruz with his glower,
Took to podiums to prove gu'mmint could not sink lower.

So workers were furloughed and services shuttered.
The president was grounded, th'economy sputtered...

And all of a sudden the government mattered!
And Cruz and his crew with their own spite were spattered.

Twas the night be shutdown...Twas the night before default, cont.

The exciting conclusion...full epic after the jump.

     The leadership, stunned, called the vote off and soon
     The air fizzled out of the Tea Party balloon.

     The Senate bill, simplified, once more was tendered,
     As Boehner, Paul, Cruz in swift sequence surrendered.

     "We just didn't win. But we fought the good fight."
     Quite so -- if "good" equals "pumped full of spite."

     Thus did the caucus put on a brave face,
     Raised one more chorus of Ah-mazing Grace,

     Checked on their vitals and took a deep breath,
     Prepped to defend the sequester to death,

     Chanted their catechisms, glowing with pride --
     Beguiled, reviled and self-Cruzified.

Twas the Night Before Shutdown...Twas the Night Before Default

The epic continues...

Then Collins cooked up something Murray could swallow,
Five queens signed on, and the old bulls clicked "follow":

Senate-House conference on terms uncoercive,
Tweaks to Obamacare none too subversive,

Debt ceiling bump-up and short CR, clean,
Sequester not locked in for 2014.

Markets exhaled and the indexes soared,
Till Boehner rolled one more grenade of discord:

"Don't touch that hostage! A price must be paid --
Even if only by us and our aides...

National default is a bridge none too far
To uphold our values -- whatever they are."

Thus Boehner spooled his caucus one last yard of rope
To twine round their necks, as the nation's last hope.

Lo, Heritage Action gave one mighty yank,
The diehards jumped ship, and the House CR sank.

    To be continued (if the world does...)

Twas the Night Before Shutdown, Canto I
UPDATE: Here's the whole thing

Does a clean CR mean a clean shot at Republicans?

I have been gnashing my teeth at Democrats' preemptive surrender on the spending levels in the ten-week continuing resolution passed by the House, which establishes the sequester as a spending baseline.  Why not amend the CR to reflect the spending levels in the House budget, I thought, as well as stripping out the defunding of Obamacare, and then negotiate over spending?  That would leave Republicans an out: they could claim the victory they've already won (on spending).

Maybe I was wrong.  Conceding the House spending levels puts the spotlight squarely on Republicans' extraneous demands. And oh did Obama shine that spotlight today.  He's fought two skillful election campaigns against Republicans, but I don't think he's ever so squarely accused them of moral bankruptcy as this: