Even the "Williamsburg Accord" permits Republicans to accept their opponents' surrender -- but not, apparently, if the Right has raised its demands in the meantime. Today, at the last minute, Republicans proposed a "conference committee" to press for even more Rewarding them in that way would have ensured an endless parade of future crises. Apparently some Democrats understand that, since Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid replied by saying his party would not "go to conference with a gun to our head."
A majority of the public believes that Republicans are behaving like "spoiled children," according to one poll, although a better analogy might be drunk drivers. Don't get us wrong: We don't mind the boozing, but even lawmakers don't usually drink until the job is finished. They certainly don't treat a government shutdown, which is tragic in both human and economic terms, as a reason to have a party.
A party that has been cynical and greedy for a long time has now become something even more disturbing: It has become irrational.
This is no longer a hostage negotiation. It has become something far more unpredictable, and therefore much more frightening. Republicans have come full circle from the days when Ronald Reagan proclaimed that "it's morning in America." It's midnight in John Boehner's America as we write these words, and the shutdown has officially begun.
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