General Discussion

Sometimes you try a thing and it doesn't work. You don't stick with a plan that isn't winning. What was a prolonged shutdown going to gain? How was it going to change the math in Congress? Once they had a shutdown, is your position that they were obligated to keep it no matter what? Sometimes we lose. If we had collectively voted better in 2024, if Democrats in Congress and the Biden administration in 2022 hadn't extended the subsidies that were done for covid for 3 years in order to make it fit budget reconciliation in the Inflation Reduction Act or had adjusted things to make permanent changes to the ACA subsidies, we wouldn't be here now. Or if any number of other things that have put us in a weird position where most people get health insurance through work but not everyone and we have exploding healthcare costs, particularly the last few years.

But we are here and we have to deal with that. If Republicans were never going to extend the subsidies, then why continue the shutdown?