A senior Republican member of Congress is calling the effort to shut down the government in order to defund Obamacare a “temper tantrum” that is akin to “blackmail.”
TPM reports Oklahoma Republican Tom Cole, a member of leadership in the House, says shutting down the government over an “unrelated piece of legislation…is just not helpful.” He goes on to say the effort could backfire and hurt the GOP at the ballot box.
“Seems to me there’s appropriate ways to deal with the law, but shutting down the government to get your way over an unrelated piece of legislation is political equivalent of throwing a temper tantrum,” he said Wednesday on Fox News. “It’s just not helpful. And it is the sort of thing that creates a backlash and could cost the Republicans the majority in the House, which is after all the last line of defense against the president. And it could materially undercut the ability of the Republicans in the Senate to have the majority in 2014 which they have a decent chance to do.”Cole made the same point to National Review in an article published Thursday.
“I don’t think you ought to try to blackmail the administration on a fight that they won politically in the House, the Senate, and the Supreme Court by threatening to shut down the government,” he said.
