Cruz Plots Against Boehner? Fiscal Fight Goes Red-on-Red

SUNDAY UPDATE: As the New York Times reports, fevered apocalyptic rhetoric is the order of the day:

Representative John Culberson of Texas said that as he and his colleagues were clamoring for a vote, he shouted out his own encouragement. “I said, like 9/11, ‘Let’s roll!' [Pols emphasis] ” That the Senate would almost certainly reject the health care delay, he added, was not a concern. “Ulysses S. Grant used to say, ‘Boys, quit worrying about what Bobby Lee is doing. I want to know what we are doing.’ And that’s what the House is doing today, thank God.”

Because when you invoke 9/11 and the Civil War at the same time, you surely must mean business.

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UPDATE: It looks like Sen. Ted Cruz has prevailed over John Boehner, and a shutdown it will be–Politico:

House Republicans will vote to pass a one-year delay of Obamacare in exchange for funding the government, a plan that drastically increases the chances of a government shutdown this Tuesday.

The decision was announced by the GOP leadership in a closed meeting Saturday afternoon, according to sources present. Republicans will also pass a bill to fund U.S. troops if the government shuts down, according to GOP lawmakers. The House’s funding measure will keep the government open until mid December…

“We’ve had enough of the disunity in our party,” Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) told the meeting of House Republicans Saturday afternoon. “The headlines are Republicans fighting Republicans. This will unite us. [Pols emphasis] This protects the people who sent us here from Obamacare.”

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Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).

A key development in a brief Hill story yesterday:

Sen. Ted Cruz on Friday appeared to confirm that he plotted with House conservatives to prevent Republican leadership from shifting strategy in the government shutdown fight. 

“We’ve had numerous conversations with numerous members of the House,” Cruz (R-Texas) said after the Senate approved a continuing resolution that was amended by Democrats to preserve funding for ObamaCare…

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and his leadership team on Thursday tried to round up votes for a bill that would tie a debt-ceiling increase to a wish-list of Republican priorities. But conservatives balked, forcing GOP leaders to postpone a vote on the bill.

The National Review reported Friday that Cruz and his allies had met with House conservatives on Thursday and urged them to oppose Boehner’s move to push a fight over the healthcare law to the debt ceiling.

House Speaker John Boehner (R).

?We haven't yet heard if any Colorado movers/shakers were in that meeting, but here's looking at you, Cory Gardner.

To be honest, given the much more dire consequences of a default on the nation's debt–even the discussion of it–than a government shutdown, steering away from that particular battleground could be a smart strategic decision by Sen. Ted Cruz. But the fact remains that Republicans are apparently not anywhere near agreement even amongst themselves as they clamber on in pursuit of what Colorado Rep. Doug Lamborn describes as "the Holy Grail" of killing President Barack Obama's eponymous health care reform law. Polling shows that Sen. Cruz's 21-hour "pseudobuster" this week was seen by many more Americans as a useless stunt than an effective action. Polling also shows that even Americans who are uneasy about Obamacare do not want the government shut down in order to stop it. And the additional leverage that Speaker John Boehner seeks in holding the so-called "debt ceiling" hostage is directly the result of the even greater harm that would be done if Republicans don't get their way.

If you thought 2011 was a train wreck, maybe you haven't seen anything yet.

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