A government shutdown is now looming since both sides of the government can’t seem to agree on how much money they are going to waste this year. Oh, we pass spending bills, but the day-to-day operations of the government still seem to be in limbo.
Democrats blame the Republicans, and Republicans blame the Democrats for the whole mess, but really both sides want this to happen, even though the public relations for Congress is only going to get worse. Ultimately though, people should know a few things about a government shutdown.
First of all, government doesn’t really ‘shut down’, the President has complete control about what offices stay home and what goes to work. Air Traffic Controllers, the military etc. are all typically allowed to continue to work. They are paid for it, but no paychecks are issued until the budget is resolved.
And guess what, even people who don’t go to work are paid as well.
Yes, that’s correct. Even if let say, a million IRS agents are told not to go to work, and no papers are shuffled, they still get paid. Once the budget is resolved they report back to work, and for the days or weeks they were sent home, all of their paychecks are remitted to them in a single lump sum.
In essence, a government shutdown gives every federal employee who gets sent home a free federally paid vacation. Talk about wasteful!
Some money would be saved by a shutdown, such as the lighting bill or maintenance costs, but by and large, even though their ‘business’ essentially is bankrupt, the employees still get paid. Of course, in private industry, when a business is out of money, the employees get laid off. Not government– its Cancun time!
This is why there’s no real pressure on the Democrats to stop a shutdown. Government employee unions typically vote Democrat, and certainly they are not going to suffer—the mass media will protect them. The Trump motivated congressional Republicans are all supportive of a shutdown in the misinformed hopes that it would cut wasteful spending, so they aren’t too motivated either to prevent it.
It’s not like opinion of Congress could get any lower anyway. At last count it was somewhere around an 8% approval rating, so there’s no political motivation to avoid looking bad. The President will use it as a tool to bash the Republicans, and frankly would give him even more control over the bureaucracy. He talks publicly about avoiding it, but his words have little teeth, and privately you can bet they are all figuring out the political angles they can use to their advantage.
In short, there’s no real motivating factor to stop a shutdown, and there are many factors that are encouraging it. The only factor that is preventing a shutdown, is that the payoffs and graft monies would stop, so the politicians wouldn’t be able to fulfill their private deals to lobbyists and corporate cronies. My, what a catastrophe– and it’s what almost ever Congressman fears the most.
And in the middle? The American taxpayer.
So, when people at the Trump meetings cheer about a shutdown blaming the Democrats, and the leftists point fingers at the right, don’t buy into it. It’s really what everyone wants secretly, except for the people fighting the deep state and the donor class, the only true patriots left. The conservatives, who truly want to break the big spenders on the Hill.
In Washington, things are now going from bad to worse.
