Ok, I am not source this because any links I post about the current curtailment of government services will be overcome by events.
It is time for a lot of people to step back and reassess what they think about governance, particularly at the federal level, and what it really means.
We Americans give our various levels of government varying levels of responsibility. Granted over the last century, we have allowed the federal government to extend the sides of that envelope tremendously, but that still is the concept embedded in the US Constitution and its various amendments.
For example, the House of Representatives remains that branch that represents the people. Its members face election every two years and (albeit rarely happens) can be replaced by their constituents every two years.
The members of the Senate, on the other hand represent a much different tradition. Initially, Senators were not “elected” by the people but “elected/selected” by the various state governments/legislatures (how was left of to each state government as a sop to being federal republic – a democratic republic, true, but a republic just the same with the vast majority of political power residing with government levels less than the national federal level). That changed 100 years ago when the Constitution was amended to make Senators elected by popular vote. Senators no longer represented the state they were from, but the folks who elected them. It may seem an arcane difference, but it is significant.
However, the House remains the voice of the people, much more so than the President or the Senate as a group because the president is elected every four years and only a third of the Senate is up for election every two years.
So, why is it the most responsive voice of the people has been ignored by the Senate for the last three years?
The big media narrative is that the government shutdown is the result of the the “Republicans” in the House not cooperating with the President or the Senate. Since when has it been the role of the People’s House to rubber stamp things proposed by either the President or the Senate. If they did, the representatives would be failing in their job to represent those people who voted them in to office.
Now, make no mistake, no elected representative is bound to try to represent those people who did not vote for him or her. Sorry, but that is not how the world works. If you didn’t vote for your representative, then he or she does not represent you or have any legal, or even moral, obligation to try to represent you. If you have a problem with that you need to go back and take your civics class all over again.
Now, for the edification of those too obtuse to see it, in 2010, the people in the polling booth selected more people who saw the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act as a mistake than those who thought it was the next best thing to sliced bread, or maybe a Krispy Kreme donut. Then, in 2012, those same people helped those representatives who thought Obamacare needed to be repealed … or at least seriously tweaked … be the majority in the House of Representatives.
However, that is not the narrative you are seeing reported. What you do see is accusations that those people in the People’s House are holding the nation hostage and are terrorists or jihadiis or some other equal vile characterization. Wrong answer.
Yes, President Obama was re-elected (in a pretty narrow race – 2 percent difference between him and his opponent), but that does not say the voters endorsed keeping Obamacare. Apparently, the voters didn’t because they elected enough representatives to try to vote to block the President’s initiative in their legislative branch.
Of course, every attempt to do so has been blocked by the President’s supporters in the Senate; hence, the impasse that has lead to the current spate of foolishness in the nation’s capital.
This, one needs to realize, is by a Senate that has not passed a budget in like four years. Nope, they just keep passing “continuing resolutions” based on the 2009 budget, with whatever other additions they like. Is that anyway to run a railroad?
What makes things even more silly is that the “shutdown” is a) totally unnecessary and b) not really a shutdown at all (but I won’t digress into that quagmire).
You see, those radicals in the House have sent over any number of bills that would have provided funding for the majority of government services. Unfortunately, they voted (remember they are representing those people who voted for them in November 2010) not to include funding for major parts of the Affordable Care Act (which may be anything but affordable, but again, I will not digress).
The President and the Senate majority leader start crying foul. It seems that once something gets passed by Congress it is a done deal … since when? If it was, then you need to send back all those fugitives slaves you are hiding and definitely hide the beer, wine and other alcoholic beverages that may be in your house, because they too were once bills that passed Congress.
Sorry, what Congress does, it also can undo.
So, who is responsible for the government shutdown and who is trying to make political hay from that? Ah, who has been refusing to pass bills that would open the fiscal spigots for all those parts of government whose failure to provide service is causing such a hue and cry.
It ain’t those damn Tea Party-nicks who are merely representing those who elected them.
Sorry, folks, but it is the Senate – controlled and run by the Democratic Party – which is trying to extort money out of the People’s House. You either fund what we say, or we funding nothing.
I know, this is not a popular narrative amongst those who want universal health care guaranteed by the federal government but it points out that they really just don’t like the results of a democracy.
I could say something about, you lost control of the House but that would seem to lack the faith the progressives have in their ability to control the future.
Anyway: My view -
It is the Senate and the Democrats (not democrats with a little d who definitely should not be confused with those with big D) and those Republicans (also not to be confused with those with a little r) who can’t seem to get their act together and fund what they can … and then work on funding the rest … assuming there is any money left over.
I mean that is what we pagani (Latin word, Google it) do every month when the bills come around.
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