News Will the House Funding Bill Ignite a Government Shutdown?

[lisab]

What I think you are missing is how deeply unpopular Obamacare is in certain sectors. Looking at the weekend polls: 59% of Americans oppose it, 54% expect it to increase and not decrease health care costs, and 51% are supportive of a government shutdown to stop it, and only 17% believe it will help them personally. Unsurprisingly, these numbers are correlated with political party, so if you are a Republican legislator, your constituents are even less happy with it than the national average.

But "certain sectors" shouldn't have a little tantrum when they don't get their way.

I'm not convinced people even know much about the law. There is quite a lot of misinformation out there. For example, people here support the Affordable Care Act but are not in favor of Obamacare:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sx2scvIFGjE


And for those of you following along at home, the Affordable Care Act IS Obamacare. Same thing.

Unions, corporations and even Congress have sought exemptions from Obamacare. A thousand exemptions (including to Congress) have been granted, and there have been accusations that granting or not granting exemptions is influenced by political considerations.

It was passed by Congress without a single Republican vote - itself highly unusual. It passed the Senate by a single vote, just before a newly elected Senator who opposed the bill could be seated. Also, the bill had elements in it borne of political necessity that many felt unsavory: the so-called Cornhusker Kickback, where Nebraska would get a higher rate of Medicaid reimbursement in exchange for the vote of Senator Ben Nelson, of Nebraska. This is all perfectly legal, but you can probably see why people who opposed the bill are unhappy with its provenance.

Yes it passed with no Republican votes. That's how democracy works. If the Republicans had fielded a stronger presidential candidate, things may have been different.

This shut down is so damaging to the Republicans, it's beyond comprehension, IMO. Well not just my opinion -- Office_Shredder's statistics attest to that.

 

[Vanadium 50]

But "certain sectors" shouldn't have a little tantrum when they don't get their way.

And that tone is exactly why there is so much resentment towards Democrats and the left by those people. Langauge that infantilizes people whose opinions differ from yours is not helpful in winning them to your side.

We can also play what-ifs all day. Yes, if Mitt Romney were elected, things would be different. If the PPACA were written in such a way that it could have gotten any Republican support - or even the support of the 34 centrist Democrats who opposed it - things would be different now. But those are not the worlds we live in.

The "tantrum", as you call it, was put in the Constitution for pretty much this situation - like all checks and balances, it protects the minority against the excesses of the majority.

For the record, I am opposed to the shutdown, and I think Obamacare is a good idea, poorly implemented and even more poorly enacted. I think the resistance was entirely predictable, and entirely unnecessary. In the words of Spock, "I said I understand. I did not say I approved."

 

[lisab]

And that tone is exactly why there is so much resentment towards Democrats and the left by those people. Langauge that infantilizes people whose opinions differ from yours is not helpful in winning them to your side.

We can also play what-ifs all day. Yes, if Mitt Romney were elected, things would be different. If the PPACA were written in such a way that it could have gotten any Republican support - or even the support of the 34 centrist Democrats who opposed it - things would be different now. But those are not the worlds we live in.

The "tantrum", as you call it, was put in the Constitution for pretty much this situation - like all checks and balances, it protects the minority against the excesses of the majority.

For the record, I am opposed to the shutdown, and I think Obamacare is a good idea, poorly implemented and even more poorly enacted. I think the resistance was entirely predictable, and entirely unnecessary. In the words of Spock, "I said I understand. I did not say I approved."

I guess "infantilize" is as good a term as any for people who are acting as spoiled children, IMO. The time to have an insurrection was when the law was being voted on - it's already law now! I'm embarrassed for my government, and I don't see how the Republicans are going to make it out of this in good shape.

I actually think Boehner is OK, I don't like that he cries so much but if you look at his record objectively you see he is good at finding compromises. And that's what our system was built on: compromise makes for good governance. He was a good choice to govern a highly polarized congress. But he has not handled an insurrection in his own party well at all. He has very few good choices at this point, and most of his choices will result in him losing the speakership. And then what would happen? It could actually get worse, I'm afraid.

Lastly, keep in mind the Affordable Care Act *was* a compromise. Those further on the left wanted a single-payer system.

 

[SteamKing]

Me too -- I tried to get wood strength properties from the Wood Handbook (a fine publication from the Forest Products Lab), and it was not available.

No wood strength properties...wth?! This is personal now !

You can get the Wood Handbook from other sources:

http://www.esf.edu/scme/wus/documents/WoodHandbook-fplgtr113.pdf

Ditto with physical properties. Honestly, you'd think that the Law of Gravity was a piece of legislation passed by Congress.

 

[alex24]

Oh! I thought the topic discuss here is all about government shut down in relation to Affordable Health Act or better known as Obama care. Why suddenly it change to wood handbook?

 

[Borek]

Why suddenly it change to wood handbook?

Because of the government shutdown.

 

[alex24]

Oh! Sorry. I got a bit confused earlier.

 

[Bystander]

I guess "infantilize" is as good a term as any for people who are acting as spoiled children, IMO...

"36! But last year I had 37!" - Dudley Dursley

Someone who won't take what's offered and ask for more later, rather than demanding everything on the instant is: a) infantile b) a spoiled brat c) a mugger d) a mature statesman?

 

[BobG]

For the record, I am opposed to the shutdown, and I think Obamacare is a good idea, poorly implemented and even more poorly enacted. I think the resistance was entirely predictable, and entirely unnecessary. In the words of Spock, "I said I understand. I did not say I approved."

I think ACA is a bad idea because I'm still very dubious of it actually working.

ACA doesn't affect health care costs at all - it spreads the cost out so that healthy people (especially young healthy people who don't believe disaster will ever befall them) will help pay for the medical costs of sick people. So will buying health insurance be preferable to paying a "tax" for not having health insurance? Possibly, but probably only after a person has paid the "tax" at least once in many cases. And, more importantly, is the "tax" high enough to encourage purchasing health insurance given the constant rise in medical costs (and health insurance). Will the "tax" keep up?

I just see a lot of problems with this, with one of them being that on top of rising medical costs, you have to toss in an insurance company, which has to make a profit being the middleman between your money and your doctor.

While I'm opposed to a socialized health care system where the government is the middleman, I'd actually find that preferable to having an insurance company as the middleman.

None the less, I'm also opposed to the shutdown. When Congress fails to pass a budget, I consider that to be a major failure by Congress. They may fail to do things I like, may do things I don't like, and I just have to accept that as the way democracy works.

But I think failing to keep the government operating just falls below the competence threshhold.

At least it's a legitimate failure - as opposed to the debt ceiling debate. The debt ceiling debate just plain violates the laws of logic. Congress orders the government to spend this amount of money on this thing, but then says it's illegal to obtain the money necessary to execute the law (or resolution) that Congress passed. That's just stupid (not to mention a lot more damaging than the current shutdown).

Either way, it comes down to "just do your job", with your job being to keep government functioning. I wouldn't even dream of asking Congress to do its job well. At this point, "just do your job" seems to be a pipe dream.

 

[Vic Sandler]

I guess he didn't mean this the way he said it. Perhaps they don't communicate because they can't communicate.

If you're going to be insulted ... and if you're going to be spoken down to and there's going to be this air of arrogance, you're only going to make things worse

http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/04/politics/government-shutdown-main/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

 

[Borg]

Workers at the National Weather Service are trying to tell the lawmakers please pay us.

 

[Borek]

The more I read, the more I think about decline of Poland in 16th-17th-18th century.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberum_veto

 

[Astronuc]

The deficiencies in the Affordable Care Act do have to be addressed, as do the chronic deficits and burgeoning debt, as does the anemic growth of the economy, . . . .

As the government shutdown that began Tuesday moves into its first weekend, outrage and derisive jokes have given way to a depressed acceptance. This is what political life in 2013 has become. This is the inevitable result when most of the essential jobs in Washington involve the manufacture of partisan talking points.

. . . .

http://news.yahoo.com/six-lessons-of-the-government-shutdown-165701986.html

 

[OmCheeto]

The more I read, the more I think about decline of Poland in 16th-17th-18th century.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberum_veto

Fascinating. I'm learning so much history this week.

Many historians hold that the principle of liberum veto was a major cause of the deterioration of the Commonwealth political system—particularly in the 18th century, when foreign powers bribed Sejm members to paralyze its proceedings—and the Commonwealth's eventual destruction...

Strategic financial meddling by outside sources. hmmm... Where have I ranted about that to no end?

hmmm... It's Saturday, and I feel like a short rant:

On Wednesday, I was joking with some co-workers that they should charge the tea partiers with treason, and just shoot them all.

On Thursday, while eating lunch, I watched the TV in the cafeteria when a news story interrupted CNN's regularly scheduled banality: the Capitol was shut down because of a shooting.
Then I wished that I hadn't made that joke about shooting people.
After lunch, an acquaintance from Russia told me that it was the 20th anniversary of Yeltsin shooting up the Russian White House, which is apparently their equivalent of our Capitol building. I told her about the shooting at our Capitol building, and mentioned that maybe Obama had lost it, and pulled a Yeltsin, as I didn't know at that time that the entire incident was caused by some woman off of her meds.

On Friday, I listened to more stories of the "1993 Russian constitutional crisis" from both my Russian acquaintance and her husband. They were both living in Moscow when it was going on. I learned a lot of things. I also decided never to ask either one of them about that time in Russia, as the incident, and what happened afterwards, sounded dreadful.

A brief synopsis is here: Two Russians Walk Into a Parliamentary Crisis...

What is a president in a presidential constitutional republic to do when faced with an intransigent, bull-headed faction among his people's representatives?

...

Then Yeltsin did this...

http://www.newrepublic.com/sites/default/files/u180378/1993-russia-inline.jpg​

I've often wondered how there could now be so many billionaires in Russia, when just 20 years ago, no one was "officially" rich. Listening to the stories of my two Russian acquaintances, it sounded a bit like Orwell's Animal Farm. Some Russians were more equal than others.

But that's a digression into corruption, lawlessness, and general greed, which we don't have here.

And as I mentioned, it's Saturday, and the sun is shining. I think I'll take my boat to the river, and go for a cruise.

 

[AlephZero]

I don't believe that is the case. Speaker Boehner (not Boehmer) has had primary challengers from further Right before. In 2012, he beat David Lewis by more than a factor of 5. In 2010, when Tea Party support was at its zenith, he beat his rightward challenger by more like 20:1.

This is pretty much in line with UK mainstream news reporting IMO. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24388669

What I think you are missing is how deeply unpopular Obamacare is in certain sectors.

Indeed:

Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker looked at their congressional districts and found that, wacko or not, these representatives are reflecting the will of the voters who sent them to Washington, a decidedly different demographic than America at large.

They "represent an America where the population is getting whiter, where there are few major cities, where Obama lost the last election in a landslide, and where the Republican Party is becoming more dominant and more popular," he wrote. "Meanwhile, in national politics, each of these trends is actually reversed."

 

[mheslep]

Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker looked at their congressional districts and found that, wacko or not, these representatives are reflecting the will of the voters who sent them to Washington, a decidedly different demographic than America at large.

They "represent an America where the population is getting whiter, where there are few major cities, where Obama lost the last election in a landslide, and where the Republican Party is becoming more dominant and more popular," he wrote. "Meanwhile, in national politics, each of these trends is actually reversed."

It is one thing to observe there are conflicting trends in national politics and thus the divided control of federal government. But the 2010 elections resulted in a dramatic gain of 63 seats for the GOP in the US House, six seats in the Senate including Kennedy's seat in Mass., 690 seats in state legislatures, and a total of 29 governorship's. The GOP still holds the US House after the 2012 elections and thus the power the purse.

When this majority in the US House, where all seats face election based on population every two years, is dismissed as the result of some localized minority demographic of "whiter" guys in the boonies, then i) the observation itself is "wacko", or ii) is more tedious agenda politics in the media.

 

[edward]

Just a little rant:

China has to love seeing this. Obama was supposed to make a trip to other Asian countries to gain some influence this week.

The mention of outside influence above got me to thinking: What are all of the lobbyist doing right now? Not much probably. They don't just lobby congress they also lobby government agencies.

I really need to know how much chicken manure the USDA allows in cattle feed. Oops there are other sources, it is 20% chicken poop.

What I am getting at is who lobbied the USDA to get chicken manure allowed in cattle feed in the first place? It will probably turn out to be the same people who will get an end to the shut down and get congress to churning out BS again.

 

[Office_Shredder]

When this majority in the US House, where all seats face election based on population every two years, is dismissed as the result of some localized minority demographic of "whiter" guys in the boonies, then i) the observation itself is "wacko", or ii) is more tedious agenda politics in the media.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_of_Representatives_elections,_2012I will simply observe that more people voted for Democrats than Republicans in the 2012 House elections. If you choose to believe this is a mandate to end Obamacare then there is nothing I can say to dissuade that.

EDIT TO ADD:
The House has voted to give back pay to all furloughed workers... I assume the Senate will vote for it too:
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.co...-to-give-furloughed-federal-workers-back-pay/

 

[OmCheeto]

This is pretty much in line with UK mainstream news reporting IMO. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24388669
...

Ha!

That look.

Justin Amash has voted against his party leadership more than any other member of the House​

I think I like this kid.

Oh wait!

On August 3, 2010, Amash won the five-way Republican primary for the seat vacated by retiring Republican Vern Ehlers with over 40% of the vote. Amash was a favorite of the Tea Party movement...

and

On December 3, 2012, Amash was removed from the Budget Committee. Politico quoted a Republican Steering Committee member as saying that Amash, along with colleagues Tim Huelskamp and David Schweikert, who were also stripped of committee assignments, were "the most egregious(shocking, appalling, terrible, awful, horrendous, frightful, atrocious, abominable, abhorrent, outrageous) [donkey perforations]" in the House Republican Conference.

Never mind...

 

[Vanadium 50]

Me too -- I tried to get wood strength properties from the Wood Handbook (a fine publication from the Forest Products Lab), and it was not available.

From Carl M. Cannon: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2013/10/06/the_self-inflicted_wounds_of_bare-knuckle_governing_120216.html

... in a memo from White House Office of Management and Budget Director Sylvia Burwell providing guidance to federal agencies and departments. Aside from prefacing this Sept. 17 memo with a political talking point (Congress is to blame, not the administration), she instructs agency heads not to consider whether the cost of shutting down a government website is more expensive than keeping it running.

And that, not Tea Party intractability, is why Yosemite’s website has been down since last week.

So there's your answer. It probably would have been cheaper to leave it up but not updated than to take it down. (That's what we do over closures - we keep them up, but if they crash, they aren't fixed)

 

[Office_Shredder]

OK, I realize this is a bit off topic but what is the cost difference between leaving the website up and running or replacing it with a shutdown home page? It seems like the difference is trivial in terms of effort and cost (as in, my understanding of websites is that this should take maybe 30 keystrokes to achieve once the new shutdown page is designed)

 

[Vanadium 50]

I also doubt the cost of either option differs by much - maybe an hour of someone's time to archive the old content, put the redirects in place, test things, and make them live. But the OMB has decided - the websites stay down.

 

[russ_watters]

So in the game of irresponsibility, who is winning? The side that created the shutdown or the side that purposely sabotages government work to try to make it as painful and costly as possible (incidentally, I think that's the same sides and tactics as in the sequester).

 

[FlexGunship]

Naive question on this topic...

The government shutdown (ignoring the temporary measure passed to keep governmental employees working) is a forced spending-stop measure right? Without approved appropriates, money can't be spent... therefore governmental functions are halted.

If this leads the an actual reduction in the amount of money spent (i.e. a federally funded park is closed, so no money is spent operating the park) then shouldn't the shutdown, to some degree, be considered an end unto itself even if it's only temporary?

It's not just a negotiating tactic... it's a result in its own right.

If you make gross assumptions (maybe incorrectly) that funding happens in a continuous stream (i.e. one week is about 1/52nd of the budget), then each week of the shutdown you should save about 2% of the total budget. (Or 1% or 0.000001%... or whatever!)

Okay, I know that totally doesn't actually work. But surely some amount of cost is saved by not operating all of those services.

I don't know how to ask this question without having someone just nitpick the details.

 

[SW VandeCarr]

Naive question on this topic...

...
If you make gross assumptions (maybe incorrectly) that funding happens in a continuous stream (i.e. one week is about 1/52nd of the budget), then each week of the shutdown you should save about 2% of the total budget. (Or 1% or 0.000001%... or whatever!)

Okay, I know that totally doesn't actually work. But surely some amount of cost is saved by not operating all of those services.

I don't know how to ask this question without having someone just nitpick the details.

There are savings with some expenses not related to employee salaries and most benefits. In the past government employees have aways gotten the back pay and benefits lost during the shutdown. I imagine that the salaries and benefits are the major part of the costs of government. Other contractual obligations would also have to be paid.

 

[FlexGunship]

There are savings with some expenses not related to employee salaries and most benefits. In the past government employees have aways gotten the back pay and benefits lost during the shutdown. I imagine that the salaries and benefits are the major part of the costs of government.

Understood. I have a friend that works at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard. He was furloughed all of last week. He went back to work today under the promise of receiving back pay.

Perhaps this is the new mode of operation. In addition to our current stream of debt, congress will create a secondary debt source in the form of "back pay" to government employees. If I were Neal Stephenson, I'd also speculate that there would be a secondary economy formed from the trading these "promised dollars" with investors paying for them based on the perceived likelihood that they'd be paid in the future and at what rate.

 

[BobG]

The perceived likelihood is about 99.99% that they'll receive 100% of their back pay. That's only based on every other "failure to pass a budget" shutdown in the government's history, but it's hard to find people that will acknowledge that there's a possibility they won't get 100% of their back pay.

If it were only an occasional government shutdown with a nearly 100% chance of receiving their pay, anyway, the shutdown wouldn't have a huge impact on government personnel.

The problem is that this shutdown comes on top of furloughs inflicted because of sequestration. Those furloughs are real and that money is lost for workers (1 day a week, 1 day every two weeks, depending on how much depletion of manning an office can stand - plus the caveat that you can't use a vacation day on a furlough day, not too mention that if 10% to 20% of their staff is furloughed, it's harder to get vacation days, period).

On top of that, we have another shutdown looming due to the debt ceiling that could result in more furloughs that may or may not be compensated for (it's a different species than the typical "failure to pass a budget" shutdown).

All in all, it's going to get harder and harder to hire government employees. Maybe not being able to fill some of those slots will be seen as a good thing by some, but, unfortunately, those aren't the slots that will be impacted the most. Some experts are worried about an exodus of brain power.

All in all, it's becoming a lot less fun to be associated with the federal government, period, whether you're a federal employee or a contractor supporting the government. The smart prospect might want higher pay to compensate for the lack in government stability.

 

[Bystander]

There are savings with some expenses not related to employee salaries and most benefits. In the past government employees have aways gotten the back pay and benefits lost during the shutdown. I imagine that the salaries and benefits are the major part of the costs of government. Other contractual obligations would also have to be paid.

Five million employees? S & B ca. $200k/a? Is one terabuck --- a large part of the cost, but not the major cost.

 

[azdavesoul]

park-service-oks-immigration-reform-rally-on-closed-national-mall
It appears that the National Parks are only closed to some of the public…

 

[Office_Shredder]

Compare to

http://www.latimes.com/nation/natio...sburg-rally-canceled-20131002,0,6070653.story

and this is clearly politically motivated and nothing more. I was generally supportive of the Obama administrative but this is garbage.