[ernie]

To the GOP's credit, a big chunk of the senior leadership does not want this at all. It is all on the tea party members. The problem for them is that they failed to keep control over their party a few years ago in their greed to regain power. They allowed and in many cases welcomed the Tea Party with open arms and now they are paying for that folly. This does nothing but hurt the GOP and Boehner, McCain etc know this and are likely seething over it. Boehner is in a tough spot, he doesn't like this but has to speak on behalf of the house GOP who clearly do want it.

Clinton, ever the astute politician, is exactly correct. No matter how tough it is, the democrats and Obama have to stand firm. Let the civil war in the GOP take place and let them potentially destroy the party. It's clear that party needs to be burned to the ground in order to once again be effective.

To the above...yes it is a major thing to swap out. It is the underpinning of the entire ACA. It is the underpinning on what Obama campaigned and got elected on. If he gives in he has wasted his entire presidency and he is in fact a weak president. this is the time he needs to be strong. The polls show that the majority of americans blame this on the GOP and the tea party. Those that don't are people who simply refuse to blame the GOP for anything.

Also keep in mind that funding the ACA isn't actually involved in the government funding but the tea party is trying any means to undercut it by trying to throw these things into this completely unrelated to Obamacare bill. It is political grandstanding that is going to cost the country billions and hurt millions of people. They had their chance to eliminate Obamacare but couldn't do it because they were not given a mandate to do so at the time and because the court cases didn't work in their favour. They lost. Time to move on and time to actually do some work.