Reid Plays Hardball in Showdown

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) “is the power behind the scenes driving a hard-line strategy that the White House and Congressional Democrats are hoping will force Republicans to crack,” the New York Times reports.

“His tactics have been unapologetically aggressive, even when measured by the fast and loose rules of engagement in a political climate so bitterly polarized.”

“Advisers and Senate colleagues say that Mr. Reid, of Nevada, who at 73 is more wily and scrappy than his stooped posture and shuffling walk suggest, is animated and outraged to a degree they have rarely seen in his 25 years in the Senate.”

Wall Street Journal: “More than any other Democrat, Mr. Reid seems to be setting the tone of his party in the showdown over the shutdown… The brass-knuckle tactics are nothing new for Mr. Reid, a former boxer,
but his frustration with the GOP has built steadily since Mr. Obama was
elected president.”