For those of you who haven't been around the block before, this is how it works:

Every so many years they have to either stop spending money they don't have or raise the debt limit. The democrats want to do away with the debt limit entirely, the republicans want to stop spending. Both sides want their base worked up, so they both agree to put off the normally scheduled time to deal with this (months ago) and wait for the moment (weeks from now) when they can both scream that the "government will be shut down" as a result of the other side not going along.

This is probably the 7th or 8th time I've seen this play out. It's always the same. Wait for the stories about single mothers and senior citizens not getting their welfare checks because of the other side not going along. Wait for stories about poor black/brown neighborhoods (not to mention women and children), who are about to starve because the other side won't go along. Wait for Todd's posts about how this is all evil republicans' fault. Congress will hem and haw and meet at 3AM for a vote to raise it. The GOP has no spine, even if they shut down the government for a week or two nothing will come of it except paid leave for all the federal employees. It's all so tiresome.

Bottom line, we have a bunch of children running the country who think you never have to pay your debts. The most that might come out of it is that the president gets a BJ from a portly jewish intern, just like Bill Clinton did during the shutdown he presided over.