How does an average person know who is to blame if there is a government shutdown??

[kentuck]

Democrats tend to believe it is the fault of Boehner and the Tea Party Republicans. Republicans and the Tea Partiers tend to believe it is the fault of Harry Reid and Barack Obama. They are not capable of seeing it any other way.

How do you persuade them to see it differently? How do you convince them that they are being lied to?

Either side that gives up to the other side will be seen a "surrender monkey". That goes for Democrats as well as Republicans.

Who is holding the cards? Who has the power to stop or start the government whenever they choose to do so? What power does the President have in this shutdown fight? What power does the Senate have in this fight? What power does the Congress hold?

The Senate and the President cannot do anything unless the House agrees to it. They are the ones with their fingers on the light switch. They are the only ones that can turn the lights on or off.

[upaloopa]

1. The House spends the money. Who controls the House?

[el_bryanto]

2. That's pretty much true;

REpublicanoids are going to pretend that Obama is to blame no matter what - but for those who aren't as sold on Conservatism, you can point out that we've gone through several rounds of compromises, that Democrats have accepted huge cutbacks in social programs, and Republicans have given up very little. It's true that there needs to be a compromise, but Obama and the Democrats aren't the ones refusing to compromise.

As to whether we should be the compromising party, that's another discussion; but we are, so we may as well take advantage of it in this debate.

Bryant

[Pretzel_Warrior]

3. This very recent CBS News poll says

A slight majority of Americans would blame Republicans in congress.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57604632/republicans-may-take-more-blame-for-shutdown-poll-says/

[TheMastersNemesis]

5. A Slight Majority. Boy Does That Show How Stupid We ARE. The GOP Should Take All The Blame.

[doc03]

4. Fox news and the rest of the Republican noise machine has a lot

of them convinced it is Obama.

[Blue Idaho]

6. Easy

Who always shuts down the government? Republicans.

There has never been a Democratically led government shut down. Not ever.

[bowens43]

7. the average person has no idea that this is even going on.....

the average american is a mindless, apathetic dolt.

[treestar]

8. The average person is to blame

for not voting, not paying attention and voting stupidly, whatever. We have self government. We choose the people who decide things. We could pay attention to state and local government if we chose to do so. Then there would not be gerrymandering. We could choose to ignore slick ads for substance. We have this power and have to quit ceding it.

[1-Old-Man]

9. They will mimic the news source they encounter most often

It's why FOX is so very dangerous.