Because they didn't have the votes, and the Republican leadership blinked. There was a deadline, and the "shutdown" would have been blamed on the GOP. You know this.
I am not defending what they did - in my mind, they wasted perhaps the only opportunity they would have ever had to control the out of control deficit.
You know how you do that? By shutting down entitlements for awhile, because that is the only way to get the public's attention.
So here is what I predict will happen: sequestration will occur, because it is too late to stop it. Defense will get gutted. Unemployment will go up perhaps 2% in real terms.
This morning, on Bill Bennett's radio show "Morning In America", a guest appeared discussing this very subject. Bill basically asked him how can President Obama justify gutting defense in light of how close the world is to open war, and Americans in many Muslim nations are at risk of being taken hostage or worse?
The guest gave his answer: Obama doesn't really care.
And that's it.
Obama doesn't care, Americans don't seem to care. As one poster said here: "Who cares?"
They will care when it all goes to pot, and then they will point fingers of blame.
But by then, the candle that supports our nation, and has protected her time and time again may be already extinguished.
I am not defending what they did - in my mind, they wasted perhaps the only opportunity they would have ever had to control the out of control deficit.
the way i recall it, boner made passage difficult because of the defense cuts and hands off approach to entitlements...thats why they had to go all *closed doors* and bribe/arm twist the 'R's to get the votes...
the blink you mention, also seemed to be the fact that the dems asked for/demanded the debt ceiling be raised, and boner tried to bluff with a shutdown instead of just signing off on the limit and being done, thus causing this whole fustercluck...
we all agree that defense is one of a very few things that the fed is supposed todo, and we live in a dangerous world too...BUT...theres a helluva lot of graft/waste and outright fraud and vote buying built into DOD that could be sorely used to better equip and prepare our warriors and their missions...
sadly, the House just keeps on allocating funds for everything else un Constitutional, while our troops are being used up...