Congress Puts Government Shutdown Off Until Dec. 11th

(This image of Congress is from mashable.com.)

I guess you could say that the country has dodged a bullet. There will be no government shutdown today. Majority Leader McConnell finally blinked, and he and 31 other Republicans joined all Senate Democrats (and both Independents) in passing a continuing resolution that would continue to fund the federal government for about another 10 weeks. The vote was 78 to 20 (with two senators not voting).

That resolution reached the House of Representatives yesterday, and as expected, Speaker Boehner stuck his finger right in the eye of those who have caused him so much trouble -- by immediately bring the continuing resolution to the floor for a vote (without any provision to defund Planned Parenthood). The resolution passed the House by a vote of 277 to 151. All Democrats voted for the resolution, and they were joined by 91 Republicans.

This is not a good thing, but it is better than having the government shut down today. I say it's not good, because all they have done is to delay the shutdown until December 11th -- a date that would certainly ruin christmas for many federal employees.

Nothing has really been accomplished except for a delay. The same forces and arguments still exist, and you can bet the teabagger element will try again to shut down the government in December. They are playing a political game, and don't really care what is best for the country.