Six years and over 60 attempts later, Senate Republicans have reportedly decided it's time to stop trying to defund Obamacare.
For some reason, it took them over half a decade of failed attempts to realize that President Obama is never going to sign a bill that defunds his signature policy achievement.
The more pragmatic approach came Tuesday on a huge $164 billion spending measure and reflects a hope by top Republicans like Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky to remove veto bait from must-pass spending bills in hopes of advancing them more easily with Democratic support.
There is, of course, an obvious problem with this new strategy.
Top Senate leader McConnell has been trying, with some success so far, to revive the moribund appropriations process in which both House and Senate are supposed to separately debate and amendment 12 annual spending bills funding the operating budgets of every federal agency. The Senate has passed three of the 12 bills, but the House has passed only a single measure.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell may decide it's time to cooperate now that the GOP's Senate majority is threatened, but that doesn't mean House Republicans are willing to go along. The Senate cannot advance spending bills to the president's desk alone.