Well...Tuesday will make the government shutdown one week old.
Boy, you've really screwed the pooch on this one.
Most of the GOP caucus in the greater Philadelphia area have bailed on you already. They want a clean CR to vote on. Other than Pat Meehan (R-Delaware County), the bunch are hardly moderates. In fact, they have all claimed to be "Tea Party" types as recently as the last debt ceiling vote and election cycle (less than 1 year ago).
Mr. Speaker, the flavor of the month has moved from Wild Cherry to plain Vanilla.
What you ought to take note of is that Charlie Dent, John Runyan, Jim Gerlach, Frank LoBiondo (a real NJ right winger), and others are claiming to be moderates.
Moderates, Mr. Speaker, moderates! You see, the choice is be a Tea Party guy, be a Conservative (but somehow not a Tea party guy --- a hard sell come next November) or be a Moderate Republican.
These guys will now vote for debt ceiling increases and spending bills ad nauseum until next November. That is probably enough in these times, a moderate.
With a little luck, they might even support another stimulus. More spending to keep the economy growing. Maybe they will even work to support a massive infrastructure bill (Montgomery County has more than a dozen plus bridges that must be fixed) to help the Greater Philadelphia area.
BTW, our governor, Tom Corbett, is wildly unpopular right now (he screwed the pooch on the state economy, a Penn State child sex scandal, and now he's comparing same sex marriage to incest).
Chris Christie will probably get re-elected but as what, a right wing economic thinker who's tight fistedness turn the economy around or more likely a wheeler dealer who stole the NJ NY tunnel money (hundreds of millions of dollars, Mr. Speaker) to balance the budget and did everything he could during Hurricane Sandy (considering the fact that he was not even here, ie NJ, when the first hurricane hit the shore during his governorship, he deserves points for meeting the learning curve).
Keep cow-towing to your right wing flank, Mr. Speaker. Just know, a lot of your GOP brethren are tacking left right now.
Eventually, Nancy Pelosi might cull a few of your caucus from your ranks or simply enough to have a working majority.
You know what that means....
Hey, don't cry; Ohio is a great place to live and be unemployed.
Sincerely,
Kevin