Government Shutdown: A Hostile Act Against A Civil Society By A “Band Of Rebels”
Shutting down the federal government is a hostile act against civil society.
The Civil War started 150 years ago in April 1861, and we are still getting over it, still talking about it, still writing about it. Some in the South have still not made peace with the end of the Civil War and hold fast to “heroes,” notably General Robert E. Lee. President Abraham Lincoln showed what he thought of Lee when he seized Arlington, Lee’s stately home and slave plantation across the Potomac River, and started burying the dead Union soldiers in the ground there.
Lincoln’s message could not be clearer: Leading an assault on the Union was not a Sunday picnic in the country. Serious consequences followed, hitting home.
Now we have a band of rebels—87 of them newcomers—in the House Republican majority, who are fixin’ for a fight. Spoiling to see the Capitol Dome go dark. Acting as if that’s the mission, the reason they crossed lines to come into the heart of the enemy. Washington is a staging ground for their defiant anger at the Union. The republic is under a new kind of siege.
If they have their way, the federal government will be closed this time next week, not what we need right now with so many American households hanging by a thread.
Now a few facts to concentrate the mind. First, the Tea Party is part of the problem. But hold the whole lot of House Republicans and their leaders responsible. If there are any grown-ups in the House, they are allowing their most radical element, unschooled freshmen, to dominate in a delicate showdown looming with the Senate and the White House.
Second, remember the Senate is controlled by a Democratic majority, a fact conveniently forgotten by the lower chamber, whose members often brag about the last election. The 2010 outcome was actually an evenly divided government, with a Democratic president to play his part in final outcomes, laws, and budgets. That’s the way it should be, if Senate Democrats and President Obama will only stand up to the rebels.
Third, the scope of the House Republican “defunding” demands is tantamount to waging war on our civil society as we know it. I don’t mean just NPR. Some of the priceless “commons” are at risk, in the proposed degradation of environmental programs. Social programs like family planning and women’s health are on the chopping block in an offensive against women’s health and reproductive rights. Chris Van Hollen, a House Democrat from Maryland, reads it right: Across the aisle is an extreme agenda to impose a right-wing ideology on town and country, using budget cuts as a vehicle.
Fourth and finally, whether $33 billion or $60 billion is cut from the budget, it will be too much. For the collective health of the nation, either number is like going on a diet when you’re starving. It’s really no use the two congressional chambers meeting in the middle, because the rebels can say they won the day—and they might be “right” in more ways than one. They skewed the debate by passing their draconian budget early and talking it up every day since.
What the GOP House freshmen lack in knowledge, they make up with sophomoric enthusiasm. They are so gung ho to camp out in the dark. Remembering Lincoln, don’t let the rebels take over and turn the lights out on us.
By: Jamie Stiehm, U.S. News and World Report, April 4, 2011
Beyond Reason on the Budget: House Republicans Have Finally Revealed There Real Vision
After two years of raging at President Obama’s spending plans, House Republican leaders have finally revealed their real vision of small government: tens of billions in ideologically driven cuts to job training, environmental protection, disease control, crime protection and dozens of other critical functions that only the government can perform.
In all, they want more than $32 billion in cuts below current spending packed into the next seven months. They would be terribly damaging to a frail recovery and, while spending reductions must be part of long-term deficit control, these are the wrong cuts, to the wrong programs, at the wrong time.
But they are not deep enough for many Tea Party members, freshmen and other extremists in the House Republican caucus. In a closed-door meeting on Wednesday, they forced the leadership to abandon its cuts and prepare to double them. The new list is expected on Friday and promises to be one of the most irresponsible budget documents ever issued by a House majority.
The Senate should make it clear that it is not worthy of consideration, and President Obama should back them up with a veto threat.
If House Republicans don’t come to their senses, they could shut down the government on March 4 when the stopgap measure that is now financing it runs out. If that does take place, it will at least be clear to voters that their essential government services were turned off in the service of two single-minded and destructive goals: giving the appearance of cutting a deficit that was deliberately inflated by years of tax cuts for the rich, and going after programs that the Republicans never liked in good times or bad.
Many of the Republican freshmen want to stick to the “Pledge to America” that they would cut $100 billion from the president’s 2011 budget, a nice round number apparently plucked from thin air. More experienced Republican leaders knew it would be impossible to cut that much in the remaining few months of the fiscal year and said they would trim the equivalent percentage. Harold Rogers, the Republican chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, warned that the full cut would require laying off F.B.I. agents and air traffic controllers.
If he was trying to make his $32 billion in cutbacks seem modest by comparison, he failed. The list would cut $2 billion from job training programs — precisely what is needed to help employ workers mismatched with the job market. It would cut $1.6 billion from the Environmental Protection Agency, which is struggling to keep up with the growth of greenhouse gases. There would be significant cuts to legal assistance for the poor and renewable energy programs and an end to all spending for AmeriCorps, public broadcasting and high-speed rail.
The battle over the rest of the 2011 budget is only a prelude, of course, to the bigger fight about to begin over the 2012 budget. President Obama is scheduled to unveil his budget on Monday, and already he seems willing to feed the bottomless Republican hunger for cuts rather than fight them. An ominous early sign is his proposal to cut the low-income heating assistance program nearly in half to $2.57 billion. Administration officials say that energy prices have fallen, but, as Democratic lawmakers from the frostbitten Northeast have pointed out to him, there are many more unemployed people now.
Some cuts will have to be made, but strategically it seems to make little sense to start giving away important ones before reaching the negotiating table. Republican lawmakers in the House have already made it clear that they are indifferent to the suffering and increased joblessness their cuts will cause. As the extreme reductions are heaped up in the next few days, Democrats in Congress and in the White House need to make a clear case to the public that quality of the nation’s civic life is at stake.
By: Editorial-Opinion Pages, The New York Times, February 10, 2011
“We the People” are Bald-Faced Hypocrites
Let me get this straight…. First, we want to reduce the size, scope and power of government at all levels, and on all issues, AND oppose increasing the size, scope and power of government at any level AND for any purpose. When asked, “What is the role of government”, we respond “No role”. We say that government that governs least, governs best. We want the government to keep its hands off our Medicare and Medicaid. We want the federal government to keep its boot heels off the throats of Big Banks and Wall Street. We say “Drill Baby Drill”. We say that our freedom and liberty are seriously threatened or has even been abolished in some cases. We want everything under the sun but we don’t want to pay for anything. What raise my taxes? Forget it. We feel that if only I can portray myself as being more angry or can just shout louder than the other guy, either through distortion or just outright lying, no matter the circumstance, I win. For those in the media, you circle the wagons whenever one of your colleagues is questioned or chastised when they are called out for endorsing or propagating half truths or capitalizing on individual’s personal pains, sufferings and tragedies.
Now there is a massive oil leak corrupting the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. This leak is a catastrophic event that will cause devastating results for generations to come. And now, you say that the government’s response to this Deep Water Horizon Oil Spill has been too slow. Others say that the response has been completely non-existent. The federal government has not solved this problem. All I hear now is “I want the government to end my nightmare”. All of a sudden, we want “Big Government”, that same government that many of you have been hell-bent on abolishing. I have heard criticism from Ed Schultz, Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, James Carville and Donna Brazille on the Left, and Billy Nungesser, Bobby Jindal, Haley Barbour to wackoo’s Glen Beck, Bill O’Reilly, Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh on the Right. Many of these criticisms have been outright lies and distortions. I say “We the People” are bald-faced hypocrites.
For anyone who has an interest, fact based information is readily available and can easily be obtained. Any media outlet worth its weight, could have and should have set the record straight on the time-line of the government’s response to this disaster. No. Instead, none of these people really want to recognize the fact that a major disaster has occurred and all forces must be brought to bear to resolve the problem. Some have suggested that the government kick BP aside and take over all aspects of the operation. So much for “freedom” from the government…. and exactly what do you think that would accomplish? Someone even suggested that we just send divers down and plug the hole. This one has to be my favorite. Unless you are a Sperm of Bluenose whale, good luck with that stupid idea. For anyone to suggest that the federal government, our federal government, is not taking this catastrophe seriously or is not bringing all forces to bear to completely resolve and recover from this event is terribly misguided and obviously has their own agenda.
Until the leak is stopped, we are all in this oil-slicked boat together. Posturing and playing politics is not helping nor is it going to help….not one iota. So for all of you, who still believe that you can stake out a long term position for furthering your political agenda, padding your wallet or trying to increase your ratings, strap on your life-vest and jump out of the boat. Once you start gulping oil and gasping for breath, it’s going to be very difficult and quite slippery trying to get back in, if you survive that long. I’m betting that you won’t make it. When it comes to having “freedom” without government or even “freedom” from government, small or large, be careful what you wish for….you can’t have your cake and eat it too.
In our efforts to develop solutions, we should strive not to become part of the problem. If nothing else, we should realize that we are not in a position today or in the foreseeable future to continue to pursue off-shore oil drilling.
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