Yikes. The polls haven't even closed and Republicans are already talking about shutting down government when they take over the House:
Rep. Bachus: Obama might 'force' GOP to shut down government
A top House Republican said Monday President Obama might try to force a government shutdown to hurt Republicans.
Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-Ala.), the top GOP member of the influential House Financial Services Committee, said Republicans should be prepared to be "brave" in the face of a shutdown.
“I would think when we send the spending bills to the president he will veto them, and then the hard vote will be when he sends them back and we will be faced with another situation where he will probably try to force us to shut government down and we are going to have to be brave this time," Bachus explained on the Fox Business Network.
Okay, first things first: The House can't send a spending bills to the president without approval by the Senate. If Republicans take over the House, that's just one chamber in a bicameral legislative body. And unless Republicans take over the Senate -- something that nobody thinks is likely to happen -- Bachus' scenario of sending some austerity-laden spending bill to President Obama is just a fantasy.
Second, even if Republicans do somehow take control of the Senate, and they do send a spending bill to President Obama that is so egregious that he cannot sign it, that won't cause the government to shut down. Congress can always pass a continuing resolution to keep spending at the previous year's levels while it works out a compromise with the president.
What that means is the only way government will get shut down is if Republicans proactively decide to either not raise the debt limit or they decide to not pass either a spending bill or continuing resolution that keeps the government open. President Obama is going to do everything in his power to keep government running, but if Republicans decide they want to shut it down, that's a decision they are going to have to own. They can't pass the buck and blame it on somebody else. Time for them to "man up" and take responsibility for their actions.