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tonight the white house the right and the left and the clock. countdown to crisis. we are simply four days away from one of the worst financial catastrophes that could face this country. this is piers morgan tonight . good evening, we start with break news. it s been an extraordinary couple of hours on capitol hill. speaker john boehner s debt plan remains stalled in the house without sufficient support from his own caucus to get the bill passed. he couldn t even put it to a vote tonight. meanwhile, this country moves closer and closer to an almost unthinkable national default. congressional correspondent kate bolduan here to explain if she can what s going on tonight. kate, can you? what is going on? reporter: it s been a wild day up here, i ll tell you, piers. it all started when the house republican leaders, they abruptly stopped debate on this bill that they thought they were going to have enough support for because they didn t have enough support. and then hou
to send it to the senate where it can receive action. well, the vote was scheduled for yesterday, rescheduled for early this evening and then put on hold again so the leadership could wrangle votes. they re going that literally as we speak. still promising a vote sometime tonight. we ll be live when it hams. yesterday speaker boehner told the troops to get their asses in line . apparently not enough republicans have, and now his credibility is on the line. most of the opposition coming from tea party supporters, raw, open, direct rebellion. we want to make sure we never get here again. i want to support something that makes sure we never get here again. the deal that is on the table makes the hole deeper. and so don t you shouldn t expect people who believe that we should balance the budget to vote for a deal that makes the hole deeper. i can t support this plan. i would love to be able to support speaker boehner, leader cantor. i have to have something that transc
delayed. police in texas say a muslim american soldier confessed to plotting an attack on ft. hood just two years after a muslim officer shot to death 13 people on that same base. tropical storm don could hit the south texas coast tonight and drought-stricken farmers are welcoming the prospect of up to 7 inches of rain. we begin with that sobering reality check on the debt crisis and just how daunting the challenge has become. in less than four days, the federal government could run out of money and default on its bills. but on capitol hill, the process has taken a huge step back. house speaker john boehner abruptly delayed a vote on his debt plan because of a revolt within his own party. joe johns is in washington with more on the political battle and ali velshi in new york waiting to see how the markets will react. ali, let s start with you. the new gdp number that just came out moments ago. reporter: this is going to add a whole new wrinkle. we have seen futures tank
john boehner, still a few votes short as he tries to muscle his plan through the house of representatives and send the message to the democrat-controlled senate and the democratic-controlled white house. however, we re in limbo tonight as this drama plays out. the speaker in his office with his top deputies. we re told pizza brought in a short time ago. they re trying desperately to round up the last few votes they need to get this vote through the house tonight. the vote has been delayed, not postponed. the house leadership still plans to have the vote this evening, but the speaker likely to cancel it if they can t get the votes instead of suffering what would be a humiliating debate defeat, excuse me. the speaker started the day upbeat and he had a news earlier in the day and he said his plan was the only plan that would please his conservative majority and he said meet most of the president s standards. throughout this debate we ve promised the american people that we