Here we are. The day before the Government shuts down.
Yesterday, the House of Representative sent their modified Continuing Resolution back to the Senate. This latest Continuing Resolution calls for delaying by a year, key parts of Obamacare and the repeal of a tax on medical devices, in exchange for avoiding a shutdown.
Here’s a big secret: The Government will not actually shutdown.
Social Security checks will not be interrupted. Troops will remain at their posts. Doctors and hospitals will get their Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements.
The fact of the matter is,virtually every essential government agency, like the FBI, the Border Patrol and the Coast Guard, will stay open. Furloughed federal workers probably would get paid, eventually. Transportation Security Administration officers would continue to man airport checkpoints.
The hitch is, sometime around late October or early November, the government might possibly run out of cash. If that were to happen, our government would be unable to pay all of its bills in full and on time for the first time in history if it couldn’t borrow more money.
Even though the Treasury Department probably would make interest payments to bondholders to prevent a catastrophic default on the debt, it wouldn’t be able to make other payments on time, which would mean delays in Social Security benefits and in paychecks for federal workers and troops in the field.
Congress must pass a temporary spending bill before Oct. 1, to prevent the “Shutdown”. To prevent a default, it must raise the $16.7 trillion cap on government borrowing.
Senator Ted Cruz knows exactly at whose feet this imminent shutdown lies…
“So far, [Reid] has essentially told the House of Representatives and the American people, ‘Go jump in a lake,'” Cruz said on “Meet The Press” on NBC. “He said, ‘I’m not willing to compromise, I’m not willing to even talk,’ His position is 100 percent of Obamacare must be funded in all instances, and, other than that, he’s going to shut the government down. I hope he doesn’t do that. If Harry Reid forces a government shutdown, that will be a mistake. I hope he backs away from that ledge that he’s pushing us towards, but that is his position.”
Cruz continued: “Twice Harry Reid has said, ‘We won’t even have a conversation. I refuse to compromise. We want to fund it all. We want to stick it on the American people. And we won’t budge.’ That’s not a reasonable position. And if we have a shutdown, it will be because Harry Reid holds that absolutist position, and essentially, holds the American people hostage.”
Cruz commended the House’s early Sunday vote to keep the government open and delay Obamacare for a year, despite Reid’s contention that the bill would be dead on arrival when the Senate resumes work Monday.
“President Obama has granted a delay for giant corporations,” Cruz said. “Every big company in America has gotten a one-year delay. If Harry Reid shuts the government down, what he will be saying is, “American families don’t get treated as well as we treat giant corporations.” Giant corporations don’t have to suffer, get a delay on the horns from Obamacare. But hardworking American families, he’s going to insist that they suffer now.”
Cruz, who last week made headlines with an epic 21-hour filibuster-like speech on the Senate floor railing against Obama’s landmark health care law, continued his crusade.
“The American people overwhelming reject Obamacare,” Cruz said. “They understand it’s not working. The only people who aren’t listening to the argument are the career politicians in Washington. It’s Harry Reid who wants to use brute political force.”
During his Senate speech, Cruz was criticized for comparing the funding of Obamacare to the rise of Hitler in Nazi Germany. On Sunday, he denied he made such a comparison.
“There have been many voices in Washington who’ve said, ‘We can’t do this, we can’t do this, we can’t do this.’ And I went through the contracts where, over and over again, when facing big challenges, Americans have risen to the occasion, whether it was the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, World War II, whether it was going to the moon under John F. Kennedy, or whether it was winning the Cold War,” Cruz said. “At every stage, there were voices of conventional wisdom who say, ‘This can’t be done.’ And at every stage, the American people rose to the occasion. And what I said is, ‘We should do the same here.’ We should look to, if we empower the American people, if we get Washington to listen to the people, that’s how we get this changed.”
Former Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin made a good point on her Facebook Page:
A friend sent me this graphic today [see above]. It says it all. “If there’s a government shut down, who will spy on me, waste my money and have contempt for me?”
We could add so much more to this list, friends. For example, if the government shuts down, who will:
*block responsible resource development
*borrow more money from foreign countries to give to foreign countries
*mortgage my kids’ future to bail out their friends on Wall Street & finance their big government crony capitalism
*”misplace” IRS receipts and ledgers to the tune of tens of millions
*stockpile ammo at DHS
*commandeer pro athletes to testify in front of Congress while watching bureaucrats plead the Fifth
The Democrats themselves, along with their buds, the Vichy Republicans are responsible for this mess.
Last week, Rush Limbaugh pointed out that
Okay. So this Dan Pfeiffer guy, he’s in charge of White House communications, senior advisor to the president for strategery and communications, he says the Republicans are running around with a bomb in their vests and they want to blow up the economy, defund Obamacare and government shutdown and all that kind of stuff. Don’t forget, back in 2006 Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Harry Reid, Pelosi, the rest of the Democrat Party, demanded that we defund our troops or they would vote against raising the debt ceiling.
Do you remember this? And Obama and Pfeiffer were asked about this. Well, wait a minute, now. How come, you know, Obama said it was purely political. He was against raising the debt limit, funding the troops and all that, and they said, “Well, that wasn’t political like the Republicans are doing now.” But these guys — Obama, Biden, Pelosi, Reid — they all threatened, demanded, that they wanted Bush to lose. They wanted America to lose the Iraq war. They threatened to defund the military operation in Iraq or they’d vote against the debt ceiling, raising it.
As I wrote yesterday, this whole fiasco is a cross between a game of ‘Chicken” and a game of “Dare”.
All brought about by a president who promises bi-partisanship…and who still wants it. …as long as everybody keeps their mouths shut and does what he wants.
Until He Comes,
KJ
Kingsjester's Blog 