Why the government is shut down.

[Mr. Dictator]

I posted this video in the default thread, but I really think it deserves its own discussion.


Link to video.

I'd really like to see a move like this defended.

 

[Cutlass]

Well, it's not like there's anyone with a functional brain who thought that the shutdown was anything other than exclusively the Republican will.

 

[CivCube]

It's the only way Obama will listen to them! He hasn't caved in negotiated once since he took office.

 

[Cutlass]

It's the only way Obama will listen to them! He hasn't caved in negotiated once since he took office.

See, this is exactly the kind of deliberate lie that the Republicans spew to confuse the ignorant. The reality is that the Republicans have gotten almost everything they have wanted out of Obama, and Obama has not actually had a true win since he took office.

Boehner has said so.

 

[Antilogic]

That was a fun little video. It almost played out like a standup routine.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

It's appalling. You people (U.S. folk here) are in serious trouble.

 

[Borachio]

It's self-inflicted, though. So it can't be such a big problem. Can it? No? Can it?

 

[Gucumatz]

@ Valka

Pfft if we go down Mountie so do you

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Since most of the dirty tricks our current ruling party uses are imported from the U.S., I won't disagree with you (too much). I'm among those who don't believe our current PM got his position legitimately, due to the outright fraud perpetrated in some ridings during the last election. There were enough seats affected that it's possible that the NDP is the actual legitimate winner.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Pretty standard MO by Republicans.

 

[Jehoshua]

I don't really see what the fuss is over a "shutdown", most of the US government is going on as normal and the world has yet to end.

The point at which actual problems (beyond the current arm waving lunacy of both sides and what it says about the state of US civic life...) start is if the US defaults on its debt, since that could cause serious problems in the global economic system due to the status of the US Dollar as a reserve currency, and due to the United States sheer economic weight in general, which would not be to the general advantage of everyone else. Thus, despite the subversive part of my minds perverse desire to see the train keep on steaming along just to see what happens at the end, I hope that this outbreak of stupidity resolves itself before we learn what happens when the US can't keep up with its debtors.

 

[CavLancer]

Shut it Down! Shut it Down Forever!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5ZSDCvUwN8

 

[peter grimes]

The fuss is that more than ¾ of a million workers were instantly laid off, adding strain to the states' unemployment pressure. The vast majority of those workers live paycheck to paycheck.

All because a wacko minority of the Republicans in the house can't understand that there is nothing try can do about ObamaCare.

 

[CavLancer]

Yes but they've already been told the missed days will be paid, so what? They have to give back unemployment claims?

 

[peter grimes]

Have they been told that? I didn't hear about I.

 

[CavLancer]

So I've heard.

 

[Jehoshua]

The temporarily laid off non-essential servants of the government aren't going to be thrown into a perpetual social welfare queue (and will be paid as it seems), and everyone knows this will resolve itself in time. They still have jobs to come back too. To crack a fit due to the temporary laid off non-essential workers, clamouring for an instant resolution to this so-called crisis, and proclaim the sky is falling at the expense of considering the actual nitty-gritty of government debt, and the various associated political issues is just silly and all out of proportion to what the shutdown entails. (and would be even if they weren't being paid I think, since to do so would be focussing on a transient issue rather than essential ones)

In fact to go an aside here, perhaps a bigger question that should be asked is how is the United States going to repay its debt? Everyone wants a resolution its true since no one wants the US to default, but you can't keep increasing the debt indefinitely, and eventually the United States will have to find a way to balance the books, or far more people than just the non-essential government workers will get the pointy end of the economic stick. If I were in the republican party (which being an Australian I am not, nor would I be if I was American considering liberalism is not my cup of tea be it right/libertarian in the republican style or left a la democratic party) I would probably focus on that question.

 

[CavLancer]

Well said. :b: But isn't this shutdown about not adding to the debt?

 

[Jehoshua]

Well said. :b: But isn't this shutdown about not adding to the debt?

From my rather casual point of view, it seems that its mostly about whether Obamacare should be immediately implemented or not (the Republicans wanted a delay of a year in return for raising the debt-ceiling, Obama being rather ideological about the whole thing refused, shift forward a few weeks and behold "crisis"). This has two dimensions, one whether the state should increase expenditure despite its debt problems (a la not adding to the debt), and two whether Obamacare should be delayed because of its various other problems relating to freedoms, moral questions and so forth.

Now there is a particular tea loving faction which has, observing all this, come around to the idea that perhaps not raising the debt ceiling would not be all that bad, afterall it would achieve the double whammy goal of reducing the scope of government and forcing a re-orientation of the national economy away from perpetually increasing debt. But this conception I don't think was the original "cassus belli" for the standoff, and most definitely it is not what is being discussed in serious talk on the issue (no its all about how the sky is falling, and how its a crisis, and how its all the republicans fault, and basically everything other than the need to deal with the perpetually growing debt elephant in the room)

 

[Cutlass]

Well said. :b: But isn't this shutdown about not adding to the debt?

Absolutely not. The teahadist plan is designed to cause many times as much debt in the long run as the Democratic plan. And the Democratic plan will cause more debt than a liberal plan would cause.