Indiana Republican Mike Pence says that if Democrats don't accept every single Republican demand for spending cuts, then he supports shutting down the federal government—and believes the Democrats will be blamed.
Yesterday afternoon, Pence appeared at a tea party rally and
joined in the crowd's chants to "shut it down." And last night, he made
quite the Freudian slip on Fox, accidentally saying he wanted a victory for "the Republican people" before correcting himself.
Pence's attitude is reflective of tea party Republicans, whose support for a federal shutdown has been revealed in poll after poll after poll. It's yet another reminder that to avert a shutdown, John Boehner must not give his tea party flank veto power over a budget compromise, even if that means he must rely on Democratic votes to get the final deal passed.