Washington ( CNN ) -- No science or religion can accurately predict what will happen in Congress . But looking plainly at the political chess board and listening to sources on Capitol Hill , there is plenty of reason to think that a shutdown of the federal government wo n't happen , at least not next week . Here 's why : . Politics . And blame . And 1996 . `` Let 's put it this way , '' Sen. Orrin Hatch , R-Utah , told CNN . `` I 'm not about to shut down the government and have Republicans take the blame for it . It 's just that simple . '' Bluntly , many Republicans fear they will be blamed for a shutdown , just months before a big congressional election year . This makes them highly motivated to find a way to keep government running . A CNN/ORC poll in mid-September showed 51 % of people would hold Republicans in Congress responsible for a shutdown versus 40 % for President Barack Obama . House Speaker John Boehner , R-Ohio , might already be in this camp . He initially proposed a spending bill that would have avoided a standoff . Conservatives forced him to go to war with a different version fully defunding Obamacare , but Boehner 's opening move was an important signal that he wants to sidestep a shutdown . Main Street fed up over Beltway shutdown battle . There may be some learned behavior from history here , too . `` I saw this movie before , I saw what happened before , '' said Sen. John McCain , R-Arizona , talking about the sting Republicans felt after the shutdowns in 1995 and 1996 . `` That 's what happened the last time we tried this , '' he concluded . Bottom line : Ideal or not , Congress runs on political currency . And multiple House GOP aides tell CNN that the majority of the Republicans in their conference fear a shutdown would cost them with voters . The next fights . Republicans are divided over how far to take the Obamacare battle right now . And GOP leaders also are preparing a second Obamacare fight during the upcoming debt ceiling debate . So , they have the option of dropping the anti-Obamacare push from the shutdown debate now and instead including it in the debt ceiling fight coming up . At the same time , Democrats are eager to get past the shutdown debate so they can move on to the debt ceiling and start to deal with yet another fight : budget cuts slated to hit in January at the latest . The numbers . Republicans have 233 members in the House , 16 votes more than a majority . Those 233 are divided over how far to take the Obamacare fight , over whether to ultimately shut down government in the name of defunding the health care law . This year , funding measures repeatedly have passed the House of Representatives with a bipartisan coalition . Take a look at the Superstorm Sandy funding vote . Or the last debt ceiling increase . Or the March vote to avoid a government shutdown . Sure , every vote is different . But a bipartisan safety net has magically rolled out during the last funding standoffs . Deadline pressure . Something happens in the day or two before a potential shutdown . Whatever the atmosphere and seemingly-firm positioning now , things will ramp up fast if Congress gets closer to a shutdown , especially a shutdown that would go in place during a work week . Workers ask if they will be sent home without pay . Troops ( and their families ) worry if their paychecks will be delayed . Families may start to cancel vacations . That is the moment when incredible political pressure against a shutdown builds . The deadline itself . Finally , we come to a public secret . The government does not necessarily have to shut down at the end of the day on September 30 . Yes , at midnight , funding officially runs out for most programs . But if lawmakers are close to a deal , the president can order agencies to keep running for a few hours or perhaps even a day or two for Congress to pass the legislation . CNN Fact Checks : Obamacare . This has happened before . Recently . At midnight at the end of April 8 , 2011 , the funding for most agencies officially ran out . But Democrats and Republicans had struck a funding deal a few hours before , it just had not passed through Congress yet . So the Obama administration told agencies to hold off with any shutdown plans because a spending bill was likely to become law soon . In that case , it waived just a few hours of shutdown , but sources in both parties at the Capitol have confirmed that the president can do this for a longer period if a deal is emerging . Again , Congress works best on deadlines , and the shutdown deadline is not quite as firm as people might think . Why a shutdown ( still ) might happen . All this said , you can not underestimate the swirling , unpredictable dynamics in Congress at the moment and Republicans ' gut-level objections to Obamacare . Once the Senate passes its version of a spending bill , House Republicans are considering attaching another item to it . That could be a one-year delay in the individual insurance mandate in Obamacare , a repeal of a medical device tax , a change in how the government handles congressional employee health plans or possibly something in support of the Keystone pipeline . How this affects you . A spending bill with something Republicans want and Democrats do n't would set up a late game of chicken between the House , Senate and president . If no one blinks , which is possible , this would lead to a shutdown . It 's unclear whether House Republicans will do this . It is also unclear how Democrats would react . But this scenario is the reason there is still a chance a shutdown could happen .
The federal government is facing a possible shutdown next week . The government has been here before in 1995 and 1996 . History may give Congress pause before embarking on another shutdown .