Tucked away in the rules that House Democrats rolled out at the beginning of the 116th Congress is a provision that temporarily suspends the debt limit if the House of Representatives passes a budget resolution. The provision is what’s known as a self-executing rule. This may be legislative inside baseball, but it's a rather radical change to the rules that differs from even from a similar rule employed in the past.

The internet has been buzzing about late-night talk show comedian John Oliver’s resurgence of interest in the regulations on internet broadband providers, about which he had an extended monologue on his show this week. But his misguided call-to-action has already had repercussions, including cyber-attacks on the FCC’s website, ruining the ability for them to receive comments on what the public thinks of the ”Restoring Internet Freedom” proposal presented by Ajit Pai.