The Republican Party continues its scorched earth war against the President, and prepares to punish the American people for re-electing him by defaulting on America’s credit and shutting down the federal government: Behind the Curtain: House GOP Eyes Default, Shutdown.

These people are obsessed with destroying the President, and if that means they have to destroy the country to do it, no problem.

House Republicans are seriously entertaining dramatic steps, including default or shutting down the government, to force President Barack Obama to finally cut spending by the end of March.

The idea of allowing the country to default by refusing to increase the debt limit is getting more widespread and serious traction among House Republicans than people realize, though GOP leaders think shutting down the government is the much more likely outcome of the spending fights this winter.

“I think it is possible that we would shut down the government to make sure President Obama understands that we’re serious,” House Republican Conference Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington state told us. “We always talk about whether or not we’re going to kick the can down the road. I think the mood is that we’ve come to the end of the road.”

Notice that Politico’s article says the GOP is on this crazy path “to force President Barack Obama to finally cut spending.” This is utter nonsense; with the Budget Control Act and the Taxpayer Relief Act, President Obama has already reduced the deficit by more than $2 trillion dollars.

I can hardly believe we’re at this point again, but it’s a great measure of how completely out of touch the Republican Party is with reality.

So, has the GOP learned anything from the incredibly negative publicity over the “fiscal cliff” debacle? Are you kidding? Of course not: Sen. Toomey: GOP Should Risk Shutdown to Force Spending Cuts in Debt-Limit Fight.

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) on Wednesday called for Republicans to be ready to shut down the government to gain spending cuts in exchange for raising the nation’s debt-limit.

“We Republicans need to be willing to tolerate a temporary, partial government shutdown,” he said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”

After the President’s remarks on the fiscal cliff this afternoon, I switched on C-SPAN to watch one Republican after another take the Senate podium to complain bitterly about the President’s “insults.” John McCain was especially outraged about Obama’s “jokes.” Here’s the video; apparently all of this whining about their precious feewings was prompted by one line:

My preference would have been to solve all these problems in the context of a larger agreement, a bigger deal, a grand bargain, whatever you want to call it, that solves our deficit problems in a balanced and responsible way. That doesn’t just deal with the taxes, but deals with the spending in a balanced way so that we can put all this behind us and just focus on growing the economy.

But with this Congress, that was obviously a little too much to hope for at this time. (Laughter.)

OUTRAGE! HOW DARE HE!

For all the whining and kooky crybaby antics from McCain and Lindsey Graham today, it’s still not clear whether we actually have a deal to avert the fiscal cliff. But Senate Republicans made one thing very clear today: their next caper will involve holding America hostage over the debt ceiling.

Two centrist Republican senators on Friday introduced a plan to reduce the growth of entitlement spending by nearly $1 trillion in exchange for an equal increase to the federal debt ceiling.

Sens. Bob Corker (Tenn.) and Lamar Alexander (Tenn.) called on Congress to focus on entitlement reform after it addresses the impending expiration of the Bush-era tax rates. They identified the expiration of the federal debt ceiling as an opportunity to address the costly growth of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

Tea Party Republicans can shrug, dodge, divert, hem, and haw all they want, but the senior director for Standard & Poor’s left little doubt today about the reason for America’s ratings downgrade.

Without specifically mentioning Republicans, S&P senior director Joydeep Mukherji said the stability and effectiveness of American political institutions were undermined by the fact that “people in the political arena were even talking about a potential default,” Mukherji said.

“That a country even has such voices, albeit a minority, is something notable,” he added. “This kind of rhetoric is not common amongst AAA sovereigns.”

(The Onion’s “Week in Review” segment started weak, but is getting funnier.)

A new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey on the debt ceiling debacle shows that Republican attempts to dodge responsibility are not working: Democrats helped by debt debate, Republicans hurt according to poll.

And the Tea Party’s favorable ratings have hit an all-time low, as people remember their leaders’ insanely nihilistic rhetoric (i.e. calling for the US to default on loans).

Just 33 percent of Americans approve of the Republican Party, while 59 percent disapprove in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Tuesday. That’s a net negative 10-percentage-point shift from less than a month ago, when 41 percent of those surveyed by CNN said they had a favorable view of the GOP while 55 percent had an unfavorable one.

At the same time, Democrats’ numbers have improved slightly, with approval and disapproval each at 47 percent. In July, 45 percent approved and 49 percent disapproved, an net 4-point positive change.

The tea party movement fares slightly worse than the GOP and has its most dismal ratings since CNN began asking about the movement in polls in January 2010. Thirty-one percent said they see it favorably while 51 percent see it unfavorably. In July, those numbers were 37 percent and 47 percent, respectively.

Of those surveyed, just 41 percent say they think the House member in their district should be reelected — the lowest ever — while 49 percent said the member does not deserve another term. A year ago, 52 percent supported reelection of their representatives while 42 percent opposed it.

I expect to see Tea Partiers cheering this news; after all, it’s what they said they wanted.

(Reuters) - U.S. stocks plunged on Monday, taking the S&P 500 down more than 6 percent on growing fears of a recession, exacerbated by the loss of the country’s pristine triple-A credit rating.

Panicked selling on heavy volume resulted in the S&P 500’s worst day since December 2008, with every stock in the benchmark index ending in negative territory.

Case in point:

Right wing blogs are all in a huff today because Sen. John Kerry said the dreaded words, “Tea Party downgrade.”

“This is the Tea Party downgrade because a minority of people in the House of Representatives countered even the will of many Republicans in the United States Senate who were prepared to do a bigger deal,” Kerry said today on NBC’s “Meet the Press.’’

What I don’t get: Tea Party leaders wished out loud for the US to default on its debt payments, so why are they whining now when people blame them for the S&P downgrade?

I mean, they didn’t get everything they wanted; they didn’t get to cause a full-fledged economic disaster. But they did manage to force the first US credit downgrade in history, and that’s not too shabby. Maybe next time the apocalypse.

Be proud, Teabaggers! It’s what you wanted. Own it.