News Will the House Funding Bill Ignite a Government Shutdown?

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The House has passed a bill to temporarily fund the government while eliminating funding for Obamacare, leading to a potential standoff with the Senate and the risk of a government shutdown. This decision reflects ongoing internal conflicts within the Republican Party regarding the Affordable Care Act, despite its constitutional validation by the Supreme Court in 2012. Republican leaders had previously resisted attempts to defund the law but have now agreed to include its defunding in the continuing resolution. The Senate may face pressure to pass a resolution that funds the government without addressing Obamacare, but the House's majority may block such a vote. The situation raises concerns about the implications of a shutdown on government operations and the economy.
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The House on Friday approved a bill to temporarily fund the government that would strip funding for the 2010 federal health care law known as Obamacare, a move that will set up a showdown with the Senate next week that could result in a government shutdown.

. . . .
The move by House Republicans comes amid a fierce internal party battle over how to tackle the Affordable Care, a law that was found constitutional by the Supreme Court in 2012. For months, Republican leaders resisted calls from conservative members in the House and Senate to use the CR as a vehicle to defund the law, but they relented this week by announcing that the bill sent to the Senate would not include funding for the law. They preferred, instead, to seek a delay of the law's individual mandate to purchase health insurance by tying it to a vote to raise the federal government's borrowing limit.
http://news.yahoo.com/house-sends-g...nate-without-obamacare-funding-145746956.html

I experienced the government shutdown of 1995 and 1996, and watched a company in demise.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_government_shutdown_of_1995_and_1996
 
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Yay, the circus is in town!

According to http://www.nbcnews.com/video/nightly-news/53065413/#53065413, they have tried defunding Obamacare 41 times and shutting down will cost 100 million per day. But hey, got to stand up for your principles 42 times right? I wonder if it would be possible to defund congress.
 
Borg said:
Yay, the circus is in town!

According to http://www.nbcnews.com/video/nightly-news/53065413/#53065413, they have tried defunding Obamacare 41 times and shutting down will cost 100 million per day. But hey, got to stand up for your principles 42 times right? I wonder if it would be possible to defund congress.

No - at least not completely. Doing so would violate the 27th Amendment.

It would be possible to defund Congressional staffs, stop paying the gas and electric bills, etc, which would make things very unpleasant for Congressmen.

But the Senators and Representatives would still have to be paid.
 
BobG said:
It would be possible to defund Congressional staffs, stop paying the gas and electric bills, etc, which would make things very unpleasant for Congressmen.
How about adding tax loopholes?
 
How come the government never shuts down around tax collection time? Is the IRS the only non-shut-downable governmental entity? Maybe that's a really ignorant thing to say, I don't know.

Maybe we could just take a break from the legislative branch for a year and see how it goes. You know, let congress close the doors. The president can keep filling his role and the courts can keep operating. Keep the same budget from the previous year (or maybe the one from 2000... see the chart below, two Republican chambers and a Democrat president) and keep all of the laws the same for one year. Just coast.

I dunno, I guess it's stupid. Just tired of hearing "we're going to shut down the government!" Fine, just keep it isolated to your branch. Turn the lights off when you leave and leave the checkbook on the counter.

http://figures.boundless.com/50b3cf83e4b0c605c0eaeb64/full/budget-deficit-or-surplus.gif
 
russ_watters said:
May I ask how that graphic relates to your post?

The goal was to pick an arbitrary budget (the one from 2000, for example) and just use that in place of the budget jockeying that's threatening to "shut down" the government. In the text above the graphic I pointed out that there is a vague similarity in the gross politics (we have only one Republican chamber as opposed to two in 2000).

It's a bit tongue-in-cheek.

Was the correlation not clear?

Essentially, the mock conversation goes: "we can't agree on this, so we'll just let the government shut down." "Okay, fine, but we're just shutting down your branch. Since you're not here to do the job, leave the checkbook and we'll just use the budget from 2000."
 
FlexGunship said:
The goal was to pick an arbitrary budget (the one from 2000, for example) and just use that in place of the budget jockeying that's threatening to "shut down" the government.

Why 2000? Isn't the Only True Solution For Every Problem "do the same as we did in 1776"?
 
  • #10
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=205

As a percent of total gdp government revenue was higher in 2000 than it has ever been since. We were in the tail end of a bubble and had a higher tax rate so it seemed like a really good year compared to the 2000s, but that has nothing to do with the budget being better.
 
  • #11
FlexGunship said:
It's a bit tongue-in-cheek.

Was the correlation not clear?
Seems an odd cherry-pick and an out-of-date and not very useful chart. In addition to being fools-gold: the balanced budget was an illusion and a reflection of the cause of the mess we're in right now. We can't match that budget unless the economy matched those conditions, neither of which are really desirable.
Office_Shredder said:
As a percent of total gdp government revenue was higher in 2000 than it has ever been since. We were in the tail end of a bubble and had a higher tax rate so it seemed like a really good year compared to the 2000s, but that has nothing to do with the budget being better.
Right. And in $ terms and in % of GDP, spending is much higher today than it was in 2000 but income was higher in 2000 as a fraction of GDP (but not actual $).
 
  • #12
FlexGunship said:
Maybe we could just take a break from the legislative branch for a year and see how it goes. You know, let congress close the doors.

Isn't this what a certain faction of the House is trying to do? Better to have government shut down than pass a budget that a minority of Americans disapprove of?
 
  • #13
BobG said:
Isn't this what a certain faction of the House is trying to do? Better to have government shut down than pass a budget that a minority of Americans disapprove of?
Whether or not a majority of Americans favor the current budget, it appears that a majority of Americans would rather see the Senate continuing resolution passed than to have a government shutdown, but the House will not let such a bill come up for vote since a majority of Republicans opposed it.
 
  • #14
ramsey2879 said:
Whether or not a majority of Americans favor the current budget, it appears that a majority of Americans would rather see the Senate continuing resolution passed than to have a government shutdown, but the House will not let such a bill come up for vote since a majority of Republicans opposed it.

Yes. I believe the Senate bill (funding the government with no action on Affordable Care) would probably pass on a roll call vote but the ability of the Speaker to not allow a vote could again frustrate the democratic process. The so called "majority of a majority" is not necessarily a majority of the elected members of the House.

EDIT: Currently there are 234 Republicans and 201 Democrats (including one "socialist") in the House, so assuming all Democrats vote for the bill, 17 Republicans would need to cross over to pass the bill.
 
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  • #15
NASA potentially goes on furlough tomorrow, excepting essential operations. :(
 
  • #16
I think this is an appropriate image

BnqKkaq.jpg
 
  • #18
I wonder what effect this shutdown will have on the markets tomorrow...
 
  • #19
Hah! The first thing I wondered is how many of our esteemed congressmen went short on the market this afternoon.
 
  • #21
StevieTNZ said:
I wonder what effect this shutdown will have on the markets tomorrow...

US stock futures are actually up this morning, about a half hour before the opening bell.
 
  • #22
jtbell said:
US stock futures are actually up this morning, about a half hour before the opening bell.
That's partly in response to a perhaps overly precipitous drop yesterday. The DJIA hit a low of down 170 yesterday before rebounding slightly to down only 128.257.
 
  • #23
http://www.usda.gov/fundinglapse.htm​

We're sorry, the government you are trying to reach, has been disconnected. If you believe you've reached this message in error, please try again, or move to Canada. beeeeeeeep...​
 
  • #25
God bless America. Each time I think politics in my country is totally screwed up, US shows that it can be worse.
 
  • #26
Borek said:
God bless America. Each time I think politics in my country is totally screwed up, US shows that it can be worse.

“Everyone in life has a purpose, even if it's to serve as a bad example”

- Carroll Bryant

You're welcome.
 
  • #27
I used to know this by why exactly do the republicans have a majority in the House of Representatives yet the government is democrat run?
 
  • #28
  • #29
Thanks Turbo but I meant more in the sense of why is it that the American political system can have minority ruling party? In most other countries that would result in a vote of no confidence (because said party wouldn't be able to get their legislation through) causing a reelection.
 
  • #30
Ryan_m_b said:
I used to know this by why exactly do the republicans have a majority in the House of Representatives yet the government is democrat run?

Because it is not a parliamentary system. The legislatures (both House and Senate) and the executive (President) are all elected separately. So one frequently ends up with a President of one party, and a House and/or Senate having a majority of the other party.
 
  • #31
Ben Niehoff said:
Because it is not a parliamentary system. The legislatures (both House and Senate) and the executive (President) are all elected separately. So one frequently ends up with a President of one party, and a House and/or Senate having a majority of the other party.

Ah I knew that but thought that given that the electoral college is made up from the legislative elections that it would follow who has the most legislators. But thinking on that I've remembered that the number of congressmen per state is different so it's possible to win >50% of the states (and therefore likely win the presidency) but those states can count for <50% of congress. Is that right?
 
  • #32
Ben Niehoff said:
Because it is not a parliamentary system. The legislatures (both House and Senate) and the executive (President) are all elected separately. So one frequently ends up with a President of one party, and a House and/or Senate having a majority of the other party.

Which sometimes works well in the sense that sometimes less action by them is for our own good (because they block each other). This is a case where it fails.
 
  • #33
Ryan_m_b said:
Ah I knew that but thought that given that the electoral college is made up from the legislative elections that it would follow who has the most legislators. But thinking on that I've remembered that the number of congressmen per state is different so it's possible to win >50% of the states (and therefore likely win the presidency) but those states can count for <50% of congress. Is that right?

The Electoral College does not directly vote, though. They are required to vote according to the popular vote* (although most states have a winner-take-all system, which can skew results). In general, though, you can ignore the existence of the Electoral College, because only twice (3 times?) in the history of US elections has it ever differed from the popular vote (and only because the election was extremely close).

It is true that both parties engage in gerrymandering. This might result in a lot of "protected" seats, and this might have something to do with why the President often ends up from a different party from the legislative majority. But I think there are other causes.

*In the past, the Electors were independent and could actually vote however they wanted; but this was reformed at least 100 years ago to better represent the democratic vote of the people.
 
  • #34
Ryan_m_b said:
Ah I knew that but thought that given that the electoral college is made up from the legislative elections that it would follow who has the most legislators. But thinking on that I've remembered that the number of congressmen per state is different so it's possible to win >50% of the states (and therefore likely win the presidency) but those states can count for <50% of congress. Is that right?
It's even easier to get lopsided results when Congressional districts look like this:

http://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/yourhoustonnews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/f/04/f0416b20-d305-5fba-9e20-e4e124d55b99/4f4db30797ab0.image.jpg
 
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  • #35
D H said:
It's even easier to get lopsided results when Congressional districts look like this:

http://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/yourhoustonnews.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/f/04/f0416b20-d305-5fba-9e20-e4e124d55b99/4f4db30797ab0.image.jpg

Are they are trying to repeal the four-color map theorem, as well as Obamacare?
 
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  • #37
This is something I don't understand. How can the queen be just a figure head if she has the power to fire a large chunk of government in the commonwealth?
 
  • #38
It's not a commonwealth wide ability, rather an obscure part of the Australian constitution:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_dissolution

If the House of Representatives passes any proposed law, and the Senate rejects or fails to pass it, or passes it with amendments to which the House of Representatives will not agree, and if after an interval of three months the House of Representatives, in the same or the next session, again passes the proposed law with or without any amendments which have been made, suggested, or agreed to by the Senate, and the Senate rejects or fails to pass it, or passes it with amendments to which the House of Representatives will not agree, the Governor-General may dissolve the Senate and the House of Representatives simultaneously. But such dissolution shall not take place within six months before the date of the expiry of the House of Representatives by effluxion of time.

Also it's more complicated than the article makes it sound, it's not really the queen firing people but a legal procedure that passes through her Governor General.
 
  • #39
It seems a strange superposition to be a de jure constitutional monarchy and a de facto democracy.
 
  • #42
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-08/tea-party-freshmen-to-become-sophomores-by-keeping-house-seats.html

According to this link, there are just 51 members of the House "Tea Party" caucus. This is down from 55 before last year's elections. This is out of 234 Republican House members. I don't understand why Speaker Boehner is so afraid to call a vote which could pass a "clean" bill. I guess he wants to get as much as possible from the Democratic controlled Senate before calling a vote on a clean bill, but it's clear the government shut down is not popular with the majority of Republican House members. This does not bode well for getting some agreement on the debt ceiling where the deadline is Oct 17.
 
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  • #43
This really is not about a debt ceiling. It is about trying to eliminate the Affordable Healthcare Act by not funding it. Shutting down the government was a last do or die effort to avoid funding health care. It will be interesting to see who blinks first.
 
  • #44
edward said:
This really is not about a debt ceiling.
You're right, it isn't. It's about the budget. The debt ceiling will be an issue later this month.
 
  • #45
Ryan_m_b said:
Never mind them, what about the near million federal employees who have to take unpaid leave?

Them too.

Its sad it has come to this. The whole economy will be effected - how are those employees suppose to pay their mortgage/rent, food and drink, etc.? Unless they've got savings (which I don't think they want to dip into), they're really going to struggle. It's very unfair that a select few caused this to be inflicted on a lot of humans, and those who did not prevent this shutdown are still being paid (I believe?).
 
  • #46
Yup. And when America sneezes the rest of the world catches a cold, as the saying goes.
 
  • #47
Ryan_m_b said:
Never mind them, what about the near million federal employees who have to take unpaid leave?
Never mind them, they're still to be paid on schedule, what about the 86 million (16 you and up) who have no job at all but still owe their share of 16.7 trillion in federal debt.
 
  • #48
mheslep said:
Never mind them, they're still to be paid on schedule

They're most definitely not paid on schedule, and some people

http://www.sfgate.com/business/netw...und-retro-pay-for-federal-workers-4857606.php

think they might not get paid at all.

Also I would note that if you are unemployed, you probably aren't paying federal taxes and so your share of the federal debt is approximately zero (not to say that being unemployed is a good thing, but your argument is ridiculous).
 
  • #49
Office_Shredder said:
Also I would note that if you are unemployed, you probably aren't paying federal taxes and so your share of the federal debt is approximately zero (not to say that being unemployed is a good thing, but your argument is ridiculous).
This is a gross simplification. Everybody who buys stuff at retail is subject to sales taxes (local and state), and everybody with other tax obligations (excise taxes, property taxes, etc) all have to pay a share, which can go to the Federal government or at least offset their states' obligation to the Fed. Taxes are built into every transaction, and we all have to pay them.
 
  • #50
mheslep said:
Never mind them, they're still to be paid on schedule, what about the 86 million (16 you and up) who have no job at all but still owe their share of 16.7 trillion in federal debt.

1. Hundreds of thousands of Federal employees including many charged with protecting us from terrorist threats, defending our borders, inspecting our food, and keeping our skies safe will work without pay until the shutdown ends.

2. Hundreds of thousands of additional federal workers will be immediately and indefinitely furloughed without pay.

http://www.usa.gov/shutdown.shtml
 

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