Why? Stupidity.

If you're like most well-informed Americans right now, including our staff, you're likely still concerned about the very real chance that Congress - led by the extremist right-wing Republicans - will push our nation into financial default in less than 48 hours.

At the time our staff is gathering content for Wednesday morning's edition, Senators Reid and McConnell have resumed their talks for a Senate deal, which could potentially get a vote at some point on Wednesday. The embarrassingly disastrous House Republican plan already went up in flames late Tuesday afternoon. The House plan was so bad, not only had all House Democrats agreed to vote against it, but even the right-wing Heritage Foundation was warning Republicans to vote against it - which is why Speaker Boehner had the bill pulled.

President Obama, in an interview Tuesday afternoon, still said he believes Congress will send him a bill that solves this problem before much more damage is done to our economy. That assurance didn't calm Wall Street credit ratings agency Fitch, who began warning late on Tuesday afternoon they may downgrade the nation's credit rating again if Congress doesn't pass a plan to fix both the debt ceiling and government shutdown, right away.

Obama's assurance also didn't calm the nerves of millions of Americans, who overwhelmingly - and correctly - blame Republicans for creating this horrible situation.

For all the anger and blame being thrown around, and debate about what the core reason is for America being in this jam there are a few key groups that seem to be escaping accountability right now: uninformed voters, moderate Republicans, and the Supreme Court.

Yes - stupid people are to blame for this mess. Some of them may even be reading these words right now.

Indeed, as a recent Pew Research poll found, 64 percent of Tea Party Republicans think blowing through the debt ceiling will have no major effect, even though EVERY trustworthy economic expert worldwide disagrees. Of course, these are the same idiots that elected people like Florida Rep. Ted Yoho, a man who continues to insist he's going to stop Obamacare. It doesn't matter to Yoho that the Affordable Care Act is already in place, helping millions - and according to the CBO, repealing the ACA would add billions to the deficit.

We also have to blame the media at large, to some degree, for those uninformed, brainless voters who chose morons like Rep. Yoho, specifically, the right-wing media. Year after year, legitimate studies keep proving that Fox "News" viewers are the least well-informed of all Americans. Even those people who don't watch cable news or listen to talk radio are better informed than your average right-wing fool. Yet, those idiots vote too - and as we mentioned, they vote for morons like Rep. Yoho.

Finally, the Supreme Court must also come in for some of the blame, in allowing the massive misinformation of Americans. While the Citizens United ruling is the most well-known recent mistake of this kind by the Court, the 1976 Buckley v. Valeo ruling - the one that said that money was speech - is the original failure in this regard. As the Court has just begun to hear another case that might allow even more money to brainwash voters, this failing is even more key now.

No matter who in DC is to blame for this mess, the truth is that we've all had a hand in creating this disaster for many years.

We just hope that somehow, Congress can arrive at a solution at the last minute. America needs another massive financial crisis like we need another hole in our collective head.

Do It Yourselfishness

While almost everyone complains about their jobs, from time to time, there are also days like today when the work almost does itself.

On the debt ceiling and government shutdown front, the entire world is waiting for more details. From the information we have at our initial publishing time, it appears the potential Senate deal would re-open the government at current funding levels until January 15th, while extending the debt ceiling through February 15. The deal would also require Congress to have a Conference Committee meeting on the budget in December - the same kind of committee meeting House Republicans have avoided having with Senate Democrats over twenty times this year. Sadly, it doesn't appear that the option for removing the debt ceiling as a weapon will happen this round, though as Greg Sargent suggested, it may get some discussion in the next round of talks.

Effectively, the deal is now in the hands of Senators Reid and McConnell, who will likely pass the bill on Wednesday, forcing Speaker Boehner to pass the Senate bill in the House late Wednesday or Thursday. That will force Boehner to make the decision we noted on Monday: Choose to side with the world and be a hero? Or choose to side with the Tea Party and destroy most of the economies on Earth.

Only an idiot would make the wrong choice in a situation like that. That said, House Republicans and indeed the entire GOP have seemingly been on a suicide mission this past year.

Case in point, Representative Lee Terry of Omaha, a Republican who - when the shutdown began - effectively painted a target on his own back when he insisted to Omaha World-Herald reporter Joe Morton that he needed his paycheck to pay for his nice house. Meanwhile, federal employees in Omaha - all of whom are his constituents - have been without paychecks for over two weeks now.

As Steve Benen also noted Monday afternoon, Terry's self-inflicted trauma has lead to a series of events that read like the playbook nearly every Democratic challenger will be following around the nation this next year.

Rep. Terry inevitably gave a half-hearted apology about his selfish "gimme my check" comment. Still, as a member of 'The Party of Gimme', Terry's arrogance inevitably led to long time, popular Democratic Omaha City Councilman Pete Festersen changing his mind, and deciding to challenge the Republican for the House in 2014.

The fact is, the kind of blind arrogance and sense of entitlement Rep. Terry displayed recently has become a hallmark of the modern Tea Party infused GOP. As writer David Firestone pointed out on Monday, they truly have become the 'The Party of Gimme' - one of the major reasons they never really had a chance in this current standoff with Congressional Democrats and President Obama.

When a group of legislators acts like babies and throws a tantrum, they're going to get spanked by their fellow legislators who choose to act like adults.

Similarly, when specific, backbench, do-nothing politicians paint a target on their own backs, they shouldn't be surprised at all when they end up in the political crosshairs of those obviously more qualified then they ever were.

Terminal Decision

Weekends are usually supposed to be restful. However, the last few days have been anything but.

The latest we've heard about the impending debt ceiling is that Republicans in Congress still can't seem to comprehend the meaning of the word "clean." The plan that was floated last Friday by House Republicans and Speaker Boehner had all kinds of right wing goodies attached. Naturally, the mucked up bill was rejected by President Obama, as all other similarly non-clean bills have been.

Meanwhile, Senate Republicans embraced a different plan floated by GOP Senators Susan Collins and Mitch McConnell over the weekend. That plan would increase the debt limit until January and fund the government for six months. However, Senate Republicans also hung so many of their ideological tea bags from the bill that Sen. Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid insisted - fairly -  that he be allowed to hang some Democratic priorities on it too. As the Washington Post confirmed, items like higher revenues to pay our government's bills and a higher overall debt ceiling are things Sen Reid and the Democrats wanted. Tea Party Republicans, of course, insisted that offer be rejected, since they're only going to be happy if Democrats get nothing in any negotiations. So with four days left until the world's markets implode, the 'World's Greatest Deliberative Body' is without a single legislative solution.

As Greg Sargent so aptly pointed out on Sunday, and as we've said multiple times over the past few years, Speaker Boehner has only one real choice this week: Allow the Tea Party to go flying over the edge of the political cliff, and save his political party, the nation, and quite possibly the world. Or, he can let the Tea Party drag the entire world into a massive economic depression the likes of which few alive have ever seen.

That last comment may seem hyperbolic, but according to IMF chief Christine Lagarde, it isn't. According to multiple world leaders and top economists from around the globe who met over the weekend for the World Bank and International Monetary Fund’s annual meetings in DC, characterizing what would happen if America defaulted on our nation's debt as simply a "massive economic depression" would likely be underselling a disaster.

To any sane person who's been paying attention to American politics over the past few years, that we're at this point isn't really that much of a surprise. When a small part of one of the two major American political parties forces a shutdown of the federal government, then protests the shutdown THEY created, while waving the flag of secessionists who were defeated by America 150 years ago — all while the extremists' actions are undertaken with a sincerity usually only reserved for the mentally ill - you know that a problem like that isn't going to be fixed easily.

The extremist Republicans even made the current debate a political suicide pact, sneaking in a House rules change on October 1 that now prevents any member of the House, other than Speaker Boehner, from offering a bill that would solve either the debt ceiling or the government shutdown.

For Speaker Boehner, no matter what happens, it's likely his position as Speaker is toast. However, like a set of conjoined twins who share a single vital organ, Speaker Boehner must now look at his party and decide which group continues to live politically, and who will die.

Either the sane, moderate Republican Party will prevail and the world's economies will remain whole, or Mr Boehner will allow the Tea Party extremists to leap off the edge of insanity and drag the rest of his political party - and the rest of the world - into the political and economic abyss.

For anyone sane, it really shouldn't be a question of which decision Mr. Boehner should now make.