Consider the shutdown shut down

Congressional leaders reached a last-gasp agreement yesterday to avert a shutdown of the federal government, after days of haggling and tense hours of brinksmanship. Under the deal, the Republicans won budget cuts of $38.5 billion for the remaining six months of the fiscal year, far more than either party had expected a few months ago. Democrats managed to hold off Republican demands to strip funding for the new health-care law and for a range of other Democratic priorities, and provisions to cut all federal funding to Planned Parenthood of America and National Public Radio also were dropped. They could've done more, but at least there's not going to be a shutdown like there was in 1995.