Having painted themselves into a shutdown corner, Democrats now want Republicans to extricate them.

Democrats know that they cannot win this one. They also know that they cannot return to their rabid base having conceded. What they want is for Senate Republicans to detonate another so-called “nuclear option” and end Democrats’ ability to filibuster the federal government to a standstill.

Senate Democrats have defeated 13 Republican attempts to circumvent their filibuster. When Republicans simply tried to pay the essential federal workers still working; Democrats defeated this too.

Only three senators in the Democratic caucus — Sens. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) and Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), and Angus King (I-Maine) — have consistently joined with Republicans in common sense and common decency to fund the government. All the others refuse. The result is the longest federal government shutdown in history.

In exchange for agreeing to fund the government, Democrats are demanding a continuation of enhanced COVID-era subsidies for insurers to keep Obamacare premiums down, repeal of Republicans’ Medicaid reforms and a return of the money........

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