Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas)  Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) leaves the
Senate chamber after speaking Wednesday. Cruz was one of the
leading advocates of shutting down the government in an attempt
to defund the 2010 healthcare law, an effort that proved futile.
(Andrew Burton / Getty Images / October 16, 2013)  If I were an
entrepreneur in Washington, I'd be racing to print a bunch of
T-shirts that said, "My tea party Republican shut down the
government, and all I got was this lousy income verification
mandate."  OK, so maybe that's not so snappy. But the point is a
good one: After precipitating a government shutdown in a
quixotic attempt to derail the 2010 healthcare law (better known
as Obamacare), Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and his fellow tea party
Republicans came away with a relatively minor change in the
statute ... and nothing else. No funding cuts, no delays, no
exemptions.  The change concerned how the government will guard
against people fraudulently obtaining the health insurance
subsidies the law created for low