On tonight’s Hardball, our John Heilemann points out how conservative lawmakers dead set on defunding Planned Parenthood could be responsible for holding up federal-budget negotiations in the face of a looming government-shutdown deadline, mere hours away. “[Republicans] have now given Democrats this gift,” Heilemann says. “This issue is being framed aggressively by Democrats as being about Republican extremism on a cultural issue, that is to say, abortion. That is bad for Republicans.”
