Over the weekend, House Republicans approved a so-called compromise to avoid a government shutdown. However, their idea of negotiation was nothing more than ridiculous, right-wing demands they included in the continuing resolution. Rather than voting on the complete defunding of Obamacare, republicans voted to delay the healthcare law for an entire year. In addition, they want employers to have the right to deny women access to birth control coverage, and they want to repeal the medical device tax which is one of the funding sources for healthcare expansion.

According to thhe nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, a one-year delay of the Affordable Care Act would leave 11 million Americans without health insurance, and repealing the medical device tax would add $30 billion dollars to the deficit. And, the provisions are simply more political theater, as they will likely be stripped out of the continuing resolution by the Senate again anyway. House Republicans simply wanted to push our nation to economic brink in order to leave no time for the Senate to make changes to the legislation.

And, their political ploy is an effort to leave the upper chamber holding the continuing resolution when the government funding clock runs out, so that the Senate gets the blame for a government shutdown. But, Americans are not fooled by these political tactics, and they want Republicans to stop using our economy as pawn in their partisan games. If the government shuts down, federal workers will be furloughed, national parks will be closed, soldiers won't get paid, and our economy will suffer. Republicans can try all the political maneuvering they can think of, but Americans will know who is to blame for all of it.