The impending Government Shutdown

@electronicmail,

electronicmail wrote:

If he understood why doesn't he come back to apologize?

Any honest man would post a correction. Any engineer would know diff between million and billion.

Guess what that makes him? Or you for backing him up?

His post made it clearly obvious that he acknowledged his error. I don't know how you can miss that when you read it.

Additionally, he made a number of good counter-points, namely that your sainted hero Bush - who you all are desparately trying to avoid mentioning - along with the very same Republicans who are now running your caucus, ran up trillions of dollars in debt, and you didn't say ****. You didn't care or rally or speak out publicly.

Cycloptichorn

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A point that I read today: Republicans, so eager to shut down the government and provoke a crisis that they can then take advantage of, seem to have forgotten that they are taking money directly out of the pockets of troops who are fighting overseas.

Quote:

In the event of a shutdown, all uniformed military personnel would continue to work but would stop receiving paychecks, an official familiar with the government's planning told The Cable. As April 8 falls in the middle of the Defense Department's two-week pay period, military personnel would actually receive a paycheck totaling half the normal amount.

A large number of Pentagon civilians would be furloughed without pay for the duration of the shutdown. Support structures for military families, such as military schools, would remain open. When the shutdown ends, the soldiers would get their back pay but the civilians might not.

http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/04/05/government_shutdown_would_mean_soldiers_stop_getting_paid

The amount of money this is going to end up costing us is staggering, just like in 95 and 96.

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

Conservatives online today seem to be oscillating between cheering this thing on and intense fear that they will, in fact, be blamed for it.

And they are right to fear that - the news is chock full of stories of the right-wing explicitly calling for a shutdown. And they have been for months.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/04/06/tea.party.shut.down/index.html?hpt=T2

Some of the hardcore right-wingers seem convinced that the nation is going to blame Obama and the Dems instead of them. I think this is mostly wishful thinking on their part.

Cycloptichorn

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Liberals created this situation and the plan all along
has been to blame he right for their wrong doing.

Liberals should pour themselves a tall glass of STFU and sit down.

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I could accept some kinds of cuts if it were not going to be put entirely on the backs of the poor and middle classes. But, until such groups as CIA, military, corporations, millionaires and billionaires and the like get included in paying for it, I don't favor a single cut.

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@edgarblythe,

Well said. Leading from the front generally means that you cut things YOU support, while asking others to cut things THEY support. But the Republicans are doing none of that. I mean, literally none of that. Ryan's budget, and the cuts that are being pushed by the radicals in the House, have ZERO sacrifices asked for by corporations, by the rich, by the military. None. In fact, the proposals include giant payoffs for these groups.

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

@Cycloptichorn,

Now if only our elected Democrats felt that way, we might have a fighting chance.

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@edgarblythe,

edgarblythe wrote:

Now if only our elected Democrats felt that way, we might have a fighting chance.

They are doing an okay job. They've done some compromising with Republicans but look to hold the line here, which I approve of - the 'riders' that the Republicans refuse to remove from their so-called spending bills are poison pills indeed.

Cycloptichorn

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Werll, I am waiting to see who gives in first.

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@Cycloptichorn,

Yeah. $33Bn or $66Bn or the current $40Bn demand is negotiable. But the "social" demands unrelated to the $$$ are totally unacceptable to me.

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@realjohnboy,

realjohnboy wrote:

Yeah. $33Bn or $66Bn or the current $40Bn demand is negotiable. But the "social" demands unrelated to the $$$ are totally unacceptable to me.

The problem is also that the goalposts really do keep moving. In February Boehner and Cantor asked for LESS to be cut from the remainder of the year, than Democrats have currently agreed to - but every time the Dems agreed, the Tea Party kept shouting 'unacceptable!!!' and the negotiations would come to a halt...

Cycloptichorn

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@Cycloptichorn,

I saw that too. Starting this weekend right in the spring break tourist season, the national parks and national museums will close. The military will stop getting paid mid paycheck. Non-critical government services like passport administration will stop. The Small Business Administration and the Federal Housing Administration (who underwrites 30% of mortgages) will cease operation. How can anyone think this is great for the economy and the country?

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If the government shuts down, my trash doesn't get picked up here in DC. I don't even know what happens at work (I'd still have to show up even if no tasks are generated by the customer).

A
R
T

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@failures art,

Obama press corps statement is not encouraging that the meeting went that well.

A
R
T

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Quote:

04.07.11 -- 10:10AM
Is It Really About The Deficit?

Looks like all those poison pill policy riders House Republicans attached to the budget -- on abortion, the environment, etc -- are the big sticking points preventing a deal to fund the government. Which is pretty telling indication of how serious the GOP really is about deficit reduction. Not very.

Harry Reid just said on the Senate floor that he's less optimistic now than when he left the White House meeting last with the President and Speaker Boehner. The White House just announced Reid and Boehner will return for another session at 1 p.m. ET.

--David Kurtz

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2011/04/is_it_really_about_the_deficit.php?ref=fpblg

Cycloptichorn

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Quote:

WOULD BOEHNER SHUT DOWN THE GOVERNMENT OVER PLANNED PARENTHOOD?.... The good news is, Democrats and Republicans have reportedly reached a general agreement on the size of the cuts for the rest of the fiscal year. As of this morning, the package is up to $34.5 billion, from $33 billion, and now reportedly includes some additional reductions in military spending.

The bad news, Republicans still want to use the budget to wage a culture war, and tomorrow night, will shut down the government to advance this agenda.

Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the top Democrat in the Senate, said Thursday morning that he is "not nearly as optimistic" about avoiding a shutdown as he was after a Wednesday night Oval Office meeting and said "it looks like it's headed in that direction."

Mr. Reid said that Republicans have "drawn a line in the sand" on issues of abortion funding and changes to the clean air act, and he said those issues could not be resolved in the hours left before a government shutdown.

"The numbers are basically there. But I am not as nearly as optimistic, and that's an understatement, as I was eleven hours ago," Mr. Reid said on the floor of the Senate. "The only thing holding up an agreement is ideology."

In case this isn't already clear, we're dealing with obvious madness. Republicans want to cut off Planned Parenthood and gut the Clean Air Act, but instead of pursuing legislation to achieve their goals, they're insisting that this be part of the budget. Democrats can't go along with this nonsense, and John Boehner is too weak a Speaker to tell his caucus to act like grown-ups, so the entire process is unraveling.

This has led to talk about the GOP shutting down the government over abortion, but even that's not quite right -- Planned Parenthood is already prohibited from using public funds to terminate pregnancies, and has been for many years. What we're talking about here is Republicans shutting down the government over access to contraception and family planning services.

This is the basis for the GOP hostage strategy.

President Obama will host his third budget talks in as many days in two hours, summoning Boehner and Reid to the Oval Office. Stay tuned.
—Steve Benen 11:00 AM

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2011_04/028835.php

It's going to be REALLY difficult for Republicans to defend this.

Cycloptichorn

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@Cycloptichorn,

a President who used a stimulus bill to hand out candy to his pet cultural projects (which had little or nothing to do with the general economy situation that he was claiming to address) can not go far complaining that the other side is using a budget process to push their cultural agenda. ......They all suck, Obama and the Dems no less than the GOP.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

a President who used a stimulus bill to hand out candy to his pet cultural projects (which had little or nothing to do with the general economy situation that he was claiming to address) can not go far complaining that the other side is using a budget process to push their cultural agenda. ......The all suck, Obama and the Dems no less than the GOP.

Your opinion, while off-topic and useless, is duly noted.

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

@Cycloptichorn,

Cyclo wrote

Quote:

It's going to be REALLY difficult for Republicans to defend this

I am no more off topic than you are, so you can drop the condescension.

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@Cycloptichorn,

I'm thinking maybe if Planned Parenthood stopped using their other funding avenues to fund abortions and spent that money on family planning and such, then maybe they wouldn't need the taxpayer money they keep being given.

Heck, if all the fine liberals in our country want to do so, I'm sure they can give Planned Parenthood additional donations to make up for the elimination/decrease of their government money, couldn't they?

3 Replies

The impending Government Shutdown

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