The man from Janesville, House Speaker Paul Ryan, is happy tonight, because the GOP-ruled House passed a one trillion plus dollar tax cut, much of it harming the poor and the middle class, and greatly increasing the national debt while enriching the super-rich such as the current occupant of the White House.
Yet, squabbles between House Republicans and Senate Republicans threaten a government shutdown by Friday midnight, the blame for which will land squarely on the shoulders of Trump, McConnell, and Ryan. See http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/19/politics/government-shutdown-republicans-congress/index.html.
(Associate solitary reporter Melissa Smith predicts that Ryan will run for president in 2024 after leaving the House at the end of his current term.)
Associate solitary reporters Johanna Jones and Smith are monitoring all these developments closely, but they are very happy to report that by one vote, the Democrats in the Virginia House of Delegates are now tied with the Republicans, thus paving the way for badly needed Medicaid expansion. After a recount completed today, Democrat Shelley Simonds has 11,608 votes to Republican David Yancey’s 11,607 votes in Virginia’s 49th House District (parts of Arlington and Fairfax Counties, in northern Virginia, where every sensible voter should be a Democrat) (https://www.politico.com/story/2017/12/19/democrats-tie-virginia-house-of-delegates-244598).
Anybody eligible to vote who thinks that her or his vote doesn’t count, better guess again.