The current fig-leaf being offered by the Republicans is more like a wreath of poison-ivy.
Republicans Spent Year Blocking Budget Conference (VIDEO)
mike.mcauliff@huffingtonpost.com -- 10/01/2013
[...] Having failed to convince Senate Democrats to go along, the Republicans resorted to seeking a "conference committee" to resolve the differences.
For Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), chair of the Senate Budget Committee, the move is ironic. She has been trying for more than a half-year to go to a conference to work out dramatic differences between the Senate budget and the House version. Senate and House Republicans have objected, repeatedly.
[...]
"We know going to a conference means that we have to compromise -- that's what a conference is," Murray said just before midnight. "But we're not going to do it with a gun to our head that says we're shutting government down and we're going to conference over a short little six-week C.R. We have to deal with the longer-term budget. We have asked many times to go to conference on that."
Indeed, Murray and her colleagues asked 18 times.
Eighteen times!
The idea of going to the Budget Conference Committee is nothing new, ask Senate Budget Chair Patty Murray.
What is new is the Republican audacity of insisting it's the Democrats who are being unreasonable by refusing to give into their "demands," during this updated episode of "Highway Robbery."
Eighteen times! 18 times they said NO to going to Conference and working things out like adults, when offered. They'd rather just take what they want -- NO Discussion folks, just hand over the goods.
Afterall they're the ones with the country's checkbook.
File: Great train robbery still.jpg -- From Wikimedia Commons
"Hand over the goods, folks. And we don't need NO stinking Confab."