This Congress is going out just the way it began: in complete disarray.

Fourteen months after tea party conservatives ignored Republican leaders and forced a two-week government shutdown, another one came close to happening - this time because liberals were blowing off President Barack Obama's pleas to support a government funding measure.

For weeks, legislative leaders insisted another shutdown wouldn't happen. And it didn't. But the House was just two hours away, and the Senate might not cast its final votes until this weekend.

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