Memories of 1995 haunt GOP as shutdown talk grows

[Lasher]

WASHINGTON (AP) — Few memories haunt Republicans more deeply than the 1995-96 partial shutdown of the federal government, which helped President Bill Clinton reverse his falling fortunes and recast House Republicans as stubborn partisans, not savvy insurgents.

Now, as Congress careens toward a budget impasse, government insiders wonder if another shutdown is imminent — and whether Republicans again would suffer the most blame.

Leaders of both parties say they are determined to avoid a shutdown. But they have not yielded on the amount of spending cuts they will demand or accept. Meanwhile, shutdown talk is rippling through Washington and beyond.

"It's good for political rhetoric to talk about a government shutdown. But I don't know anybody that wants that to happen," Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., said on "Fox News Sunday."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g-Yzm_vbADLRyt7GSD0GeW2szMfQ?docId=b812e17e91aa4455910410e505b9e8c5

It is the enemies from within that can destroy us. And these are they.

[TheCowsCameHome]

1. Do it GOP, just shut up and do it.

Kiss 2012 and beyond goodbye.

[RKP5637]

3. I'm sure all of the RW spin artists are already preparing their hate show talking points to

spin 7x24 any shutdown as solely the dems fault. If there were to be a shutdown, I sure as hell hope the dems get their messaging right. Sometimes IMO it's pretty lackluster.

[TheCowsCameHome]

7. I agree.

I hear a major Boston radio statio say something to the effect that Dems were mulling a shutdown.....already the lies have begun.

That cannot stand.

[Lasher]

9. I couldn't agree more.

let Democrats be Democrats and let Republicans show themselves to be the scourge that they are.

[RKP5637]

2. The US consistently makes its most damage from within more than from outside. We are

consistently our own worst enemy.

[SaveAmerica]

5. Abe Lincoln said that our destruction will come from within, here we are proving him right

"I answer, if it ever reach us, it
must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction
be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation
of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide."

[RKP5637]

6. +1000 +++ n/t

[Ken Burch]

4. They really didn't suffer that much after '95

And OUR party leadership didn't even TRY to take the House back...which should have been an EASY victory. They decided that re-electing the most conservative "Democratic" president since Grover Cleveland, on a platform that abandoned workers and the poor, was ALL that mattered. Thanks to the DLC, the 1996 election was totally meaningless.

[sad sally]

11. And it cost the taxpayers over $400 million in lost wages.

Federal employees, furloughed almost 3 weeks, never lost a day of pay. Not that they should have, but it didn't draw a lot of sympathy for them from taxpayers - guess it was part of Pres. Clinton's ethics program (his first directive to federal employees).

[Silver Swan]

12. I was a Federal employee back then.

I was scheduled for vacation during the shutdown period. They told us we might not be be paid for our vacation days.

I took my scheduled vacation anyway because the days were "use or lose" days that I supposedly could not carry over to the next year. After the shutdown was over, I was paid for my vacation days. In addition, the vacation days that I took that I would have lost if I had not taken them by the end of the fiscal year, were restored to me in spite of the fact that I then had more than the carry-over limit of vacation days to use the next year.

Yes, that worked really well for the Republicans, didn't it?

[sad sally]

14. So was I.

[no_hypocrisy]

8. If I were in charge of the DNC, I'd have public service ads ready on the first day of the shut-down.

Call John Boehner and tell him to give you your Social Security check.

Tell the Republicans in Congress to unlock the doors to the courtroom.

Stuff like that.

[upi402]

10. They make the mess, then get in the way as we try to clean it up

Do congresscritters get spankings or just time outs?

[David__77]

13. I say let it collapse. Do not budge an inch to them.

Let them be responsible for the collapse.