WASHINGTON — A Republican congressman told The Flipside that top Republican congressmen and governors have been privately pushing for the party to demand a return to the Articles of Confederation during negotiations over the debt ceiling and the current government shutdown.

“It’s mainly Cruz and Jindal,” said a Republican congressman who refused to be named. “They were laughed out of the room at first, but they keep insisting on it, and I think that they’re starting to gain sway over even some of the more moderate members of the caucus. They’re saying that we need to go back to the original intent of the Founding Fathers, before the whole Constitution. Which is pretty darn reasonable if you ask me, an elected official of the United States Congress.”

The Articles of Confederation were ratified in 1781 and replaced by the Constitution in 1789 due to widespread federalist and nationalist opposition to the Articles. The Articles of Confederation do not contain a president, a Supreme Court, congressional power of taxation, or congressional power to regulate foreign or interstate trade. Such a proposal thus represents a minor increase in the extents of recent Republican demands during negotiations.

“Obviously, they’re not advocating that we negotiate for a straight return to the Articles without modification,” said the Republican congressman. “That would be lunacy. They’re obviously going to include amendments making it easier to finance the strongest army in the world, exclusively through sales taxes that everyone with an income higher than a quarter of a million dollars a year will be exempt from if they can get Obama to agree to it – which they probably can, because otherwise the entire global economy will probably collapse,” said the congressman as he puffed on a cigar.

The Republican congressman was optimistic about the likelihood of re-ratifying the Articles, saying, “It’ll essentially permanently shut down the federal government, but that’s just solidifying things the way they are now, right? Then we’ll know we can never become a Socialist state. It’ll also impeach Obama, which he would probably welcome at this point. And it would prevent all future presidential elections from happening, which we can all get behind.”