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This shutdown should not have happened. The framers of our Constitution designed our system to have tension and differences between the two houses of the Congress. That's a given. But after the House and Senate have exercised their best judgment, they are then supposed to then sit down and negotiate out their disagreements. This is the way our bicameral system has worked for 225 years. It is the only way that it CAN work. That hasn't happened this time.

A crisis is not a good time for inflammatory rhetoric and ad hominem attacks. I will simply say that yesterday, the President missed an opportunity to bring both sides together. That responsibility now rests solely with us. Nobody on the Republican side of the aisle wants to see a government shutdown or a credit default. And I am confident that nobody on the Democratic side wants to see millions of Americans lose the health plans they were told they could keep; or see their healthcare costs skyrocket, or lose their jobs or work hours because of the unintended consequences of Obamacare.

I was deeply saddened to see the President begin the sixth year of our nation's economic malaise by renewing his partisan name-calling and finger pointing on Monday.

This act takes on poignant and crucial importance to my district in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California, where the Yosemite Rim fire continues to burn through more than 400 square miles of forest land.

Amidst the international humiliation and farce we have suffered with our abortive war with Syria, there are two good things the President has done, and they need to be noted. Last night, he stepped back from an international crisis that could have had catastrophic consequences, by deferring to the Russian diplomatic initiative. Thank God. And last week, he stepped back from a constitutional crisis, by deferring to Congress the decision over whether to go to war - as the Constitution requires.

Russia's diplomatic intervention in the Syrian crisis is welcome news - but whether it is real or illusory, the President needs to step back from the precipice he has taken us to. The President has made his case for war with Syria very clearly: that the United States must punish the use of chemical weapons and if we don't they are more likely to be used again. He assures us that the strike will be limited and that it will aid moderates fighting the regime. He warns that American credibility is at stake. The case is clear. It is simply not convincing.