My Kingdom for a Government!

I decided to do the blog assignment on the recent and ongoing government shutdown by republicans throwing a temper tantrum and stomping their feet. I’ve read a few articles and watched a few videos on why this is happening, and I’d like to try to explain it to the best of my ability. Here we go.

Ok. Let’s start off with the fact that both the House of Representatives and the Senate are terrible at their jobs. The current shutdown crisis came from the fact that the House and the Senate need to pass a continuing resolution; that is, an act that says, basically, “we need money to do things, so we need to pass the budget. However, none of us feel like doing anything right now, so we need this act to say that we need more time to pass the budget. Eventually.” The Senate (controlled by democrats) said “sure, let’s pass this act, because this is probably the least amount of work we can do and still be technically doing something.” So they pass this continuing resolution to the House. The House, which is of course, republican controlled, say “Sure, we’ll pass this thing, so we don’t have to do really anything but sit back and enjoy our millions rolling in. Except that we don’t want Obamacare to go into effect this year. Maybe next year.” So, the Senate says “Well, Obamacare has actually been a law since 2008, it’s been picked through by the Supreme Court, it’s one of the greatest pieces of social policy change in the last fifty years. It’s not going anywhere.” So the House comes back with “Well, if we don’t get to stop the implementation of Obamacare, we’re taking our ball and going home. Phooey.” The continuing resolution doesn’t pass, and due to lack of funds (because no extension of the budget has been made), the government shuts its doors. It “furloughs” (a fancy name for indefinite firing) several hundred thousand employees, and everyone sits on their hands. That’s where we are now. Welcome to the miracle of the American Legislative system.


Sources:

The Lowdown on the Shutdown. ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTJubcZFA78 )

No deal yet: Government shutdown, debt limit talks continue. ( http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57607188/no-deal-yet-government-shutdown-debt-limit-talks-continue/ )

United States federal government shutdown of 2013. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_government_shutdown_of_2013 )

No deal to end shutdown but talks continue between Obama, GOP. ( http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-government-shutdown-20131011,0,791104.story )

Obamacare and October 1st: Healthcare Triage #1. ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBr3fniyb4w )