Nate Silver expects a government shutdown will focus the public's attention on Washington. Mark Blumenthal agrees:
[A] real shutdown will raise the profile of the budget story considerably. The last government shutdown, in late 1995 and early 1996, caused the number of Americans following news about the budget debate "very closely" to nearly double (from 20 percent to 36 percent), while the number following the story "fairly" or "very closely" jumped by 19 points (from 55 percent to 74 percent) on the Pew Research tracking poll.
With that sort of increased spotlight, judgments about blame and performance are very much subject to change.
The Dish 