Reminder: while the Democrats are trying to signal they have some power to resist, the truth is that the Republican party can end the filibuster rule today and pass whatever budget bill they like without requiring a single Democrat vote.

They had no problem carving out an exception to the filibuster rule when pushing through district court judges and later Supreme Court justices without Democrat support, so they can't even argue that they consider the filibuster sacrosanct: they don't.

This government shutdown is exclusively a problem of Republican making.

> They had no problem carving out an exception to the filibuster rule when pushing through district court judges and later Supreme Court justices without Democrat support

Democrats removed the filibuster on district and appellate court judges.

It plays well with the base.

They want to destroy government, and this is helping. They want this. Keeping government open isn't something they want, let alone to fight for.