HERE WE GO AGAIN.

Regular order appropriations are the last thing Washington politicians want.  "It's as if nobody in Washington wants to be bothered with regular order appropriations."

Christmas is a-comin' and the figs are in the pudding.

Senators in both parties are bracing for another government shutdown next year after Republicans blocked a proposal to extend expiring health insurance subsidies, the issue that triggered the 43-day closure that consumed much of the fall calendar.

Liberal Democrats in the Senate are fuming that Republicans blocked a proposal to extend the subsidies, which are due to expire in January, through 2028.

A group of eight Democrats, mostly centrists, voted last month to reopen the government in hopes that Republicans might agree to a bipartisan compromise to prevent health insurance premiums for plans on the ObamaCare marketplace from soaring by double digits.

Typical Washington spin from Alexander Bolton of the Hill.  Health insurance premiums "soar by double digits" because there's no price discovery in medicine, and those controversial subsidies do nothing to stay the hands of insurers from raising the premiums.  Voters, meanwhile, are treated as so blinded that they don't see that the so-called subsidies also come out of their pockets, only with tax withholding that money never gets to their pockets in the first place.

And that conjuring trick makes possible another round of shutdown theater.

Instead, the bipartisan talks to extend the subsidies foundered, setting the stage for a massive spike in health care premiums next year.

This has given new momentum to liberals to argue Democrats should use the upcoming Jan. 30 government funding deadline as leverage — just as they did in September and October — to force Republicans to make major concessions on federal health care spending.

After Republicans defeated a Democratic bill to extend the subsidies for three years, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said the next government funding deadline is a leverage point.

“The fight is not over,” she said.

Why, it's as if having leverage points for pet projects trumps regular order appropriations.  Sure, Official Washington can continue to point to what is seen — insurance premiums bloated by the absence of price discovery and the possible presence of subsidies — while pretending the current higher taxes and future inflation stemming from monetized government borrowing come out of somebody else's pocket, perhaps that legendary fellow behind the tree.

Congress’s failure to extend the enhanced subsidies means an estimated 4.8 million Americans will lose health care coverage in 2026 and more than 20 million Americans will see their health care costs rise dramatically.

Insurance companies are projected to charge people who buy their insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplace 26 percent more if the enhanced subsidies expire in January.

Read on, though,and consider whether something else might be afoot.

A third member of the Senate Democratic Caucus who requested anonymity to speak candidly about the political situation said another government shutdown is possible if Republicans don’t agree to pass a package of regular spending bills known as the minibus by the end of next month.

The Democratic senators said Democrats would have far less leverage if the Senate appropriations package, which covers the departments of Defense, Health and Human Services, Labor, Commerce, Justice and Interior, among other agencies, passes next month.

If President Trump signs that package into law, it would result in approximately 85 percent of the federal government being funded through September 2026, leaving Democrats much less leverage to threaten a shutdown to get Republicans to agree to an extension of the enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits — the issue that triggered the shutdown in October.

“If they [bring] the group of five bills to the floor and we get them coordinated with … the House, then essentially you have appropriations bills for 85, 95 percent of the government by the end of January, and shutdown doesn’t mean much,” the lawmaker said.

The worst possible thing for Democrats in opposition might be regular order appropriations, as once those are passed and signed, there's no leverage for holding up the regular order of constituents' lives, the better to extort more benefits for favored constituents.

Read on, though, and discover that clearing a path for regular order comes with a seasoning of the trickery that makes the bloated continuing resolution a favorite on both sides of the metaphorical aisle.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) said she’s worried about another shutdown if the five-bill spending package fails to move soon after New Year’s Day.

“My worry is if we don’t pass this five-bill package, we will end up in a shutdown,” she said.

The five-bill appropriations minibus is being delayed in the Senate by conservative Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah), Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who are objecting to the number of earmarks in the appropriations bill, authorizing language they said should be attached to spending legislation, and the sheer size of the package.

That's what happens when you try to stuff at least four coalitions into two political parties.  The Schumer Shutdown might have been his tactic to appease the more free-spending part of his party.  The threat of a shutdown might be a tactic for compromise-minded Republicans to keep the less free-spending people of their party from, oh, dialing back Washington's fiscal incontinence.