Rethuglican Divide Widening

We noted yesterday that wide cracks are appearing in the Rethuglican facade over the Government shutdown and their threats to default on the debt.  As meetings between House Dems and Rethugs might signal some movement toward an endgame, the perpetrators of this extortion are beginning to duck for cover.  With Wall Street signaling that they've had enough of the pointless hostage-taking by the teabaggers, even the notorious Kochs are disavowing their role in linking the shutdown with attempts to defund the Affordable Care Act.  Oh, and the public opinion of the Rethugs?  Only 28 percent have a favorable view of the party, lowest since measuring began 21 years ago.

Now, the 2008 Rethuglican Presidential nominee and bitter dude Sen. John "Grampypants" McCain is blaming the teabagger forces for the debacle.  He and other traditional conservatives are seeing the unraveling of their party thanks to the far-right, no compromise, burn-it-down, racist birthers that make up the hardcore voting base of the Rethuglican/New Confederate Party.  It can't unravel fast enough for the sake of our democracy.

When You've Lost...

Bloomberg BusinessWeek:

It’s part of the essential give-and-take of American politics. But the debate hasn’t amounted to much lately, in part because Republicans haven’t been holding up their end of the argument.

Instead, a vocal minority of Tea Party Republicans forced a government shutdown over its opposition to Obamacare, which passed a milestone on Oct. 1 when the first websites offering health insurance went online. It’s worth dwelling, yet again, on the quixotic nature of House Republicans’ demands that the White House and Senate Democrats defund or delay the Affordable Care Act.

And:

If Republican lawmakers were as responsive to business concerns as they once were, the chance of a prolonged shutdown would be slim. But that’s no longer the case. “Republicans are not the party of business anymore,” says Robert Shapiro, chairman of the economic advisory firm Sonecon. “They’re the party of antigovernment.”

 Goldman Sachs' Lloyd Effin' Blankfein:

Goldman Sachs chief executive Lloyd Blankfein, while stressing that the business leaders who met with Obama represented diverse political views, implicitly criticized Republicans for using their opposition to the healthcare law as a weapon that could lead to a U.S. default.

"You can litigate these policy issues. You can re-litigate these policy issues in a political forum, but they shouldn't use the threat of causing the U.S. to fail on its ... obligations to repay on its debt as a cudgel," Blankfein said.