Once again, Washington faces the prospect of a government shutdown. House Republicans passed a stopgap funding measure after midnight last night that Senate Democrats vowed to reject. Speaker of the House John Boehner failed to pass a similar bill Wednesday over the objections of House Democrats and conservative Republicans. That bill would have funded the government through November 18, but also paired disaster relief with budget cuts, which Democrats objected to. Boehner appeased fiscal hawks in his party Thursday night by adding an additional $100 million in cuts from a loan program that funded the bankrupt solar-panel company Solyndra. Senate Democrats immediately promised to kill the bill, saying it was unacceptable to demand cuts in exchange for disaster relief.
