Tom Harkin: “we find ourselves in yet another ``Alice in Wonderland'' moment here in the Senate. We are again on the brink of a…”

“we find ourselves in yet another ``Alice in Wonderland'' moment here in the Senate. We are again on the brink of a government shutdown for no reason other than the House Republicans' absolute obsession with repealing the Affordable Care Act. Their strategy isn't anything new. They are running the same old plays out of the same old playbook that they have used for 3 years. None of these attempts have worked, but failure is no deterrent if all you care about is scoring political points with your political base. The House has voted 42 times to repeal or defund the Affordable Care Act. You would think after the first 41, they might get a sense that it is just a waste of time. But, no, the House is at it again, risking the widespread economic damage that a government shutdown would cause just so they can indulge their political obsession yet one more time. I sort of half-facetiously said last weekend that the good news is that the obsessive-compulsive disorder is covered under ObamaCare--just in case these House Republicans might care to use it. Defunding the Affordable Care Act would deprive Americans of all of the law's benefits, such as historic consumer protections, affordable coverage, and cheaper prescription drugs, just to mention a few. Work on the insurance marketplace, which will be open for business, as we know, next Tuesday, would stop.…”