Tag: Government shutdown

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Donald Trump Featured

This Is Not What Dr. King Had in Mind

I suppose if you really want to bury a less-than-serious proposal that would attempt to solve the most vexing issue of the day, then you should announce it on the Saturday afternoon of a long holiday weekend. And you should make sure to propose something that gives you everything you want, but only three years and not cover everyone that the other side wants.

Such is what the president (shudder) proposed on Saturday. Perhaps it’s just an opening gambit, but history has shown that Donald Trump doesn’t favor protracted negotiations that don’t end with him getting his way. I suppose that Nancy Pelosi leaving town is the Democrats’ answer.

Education is also roaring back into the country’s news feed, what with the Los Angeles teachers on strike over working conditions, yes, but mostly about…Charter Schools. You know, those lovely places that are publicly funded, but privately run. It’s a setup that drains resources from public schools and aims to suppress union activism from teachers, and the research we have is that charters are really no better that public schools when it comes to student achievement and educational effectiveness.

Couple this with the walkouts in West Virginia, Oklahoma and other states last year, and you have a trend that will only get stronger. Plus, the new congress includes liberal members who not only support public education and teachers, but are also willing to point out that President Obama and Arne Duncan were both wrong to support the testing movement and faux teacher evaluation systems that did more harm than good. Most public school teachers are effective, and that has been substantiated by the fact that teachers have not been fired in large numbers, as proponents of the new system said would happen. And now, at least in New Jersey, the standardized tests that wrecked the curriculum are gone.

But just in case you thought that the purpose of education was to prepare students to live, think, and work in the modern world, we have the story of Karen Pence, wife of the Vice President, who went back to her teaching career this year at a school that, well, you have to read it.

And you thought that the right wing’s denial of science was limited to the climate.

Here we have an instance where the denial of human rights, human intelligence, human compassion, and human acceptance is the curriculum. I understand the right of religious people to live a religious life, but I do not understand, nor can I countenance, a school where children are taught that their neighbors should be disrespected, hated, marginalized, and emotionally harmed in the name of an ideology that blames rather than accepts.

Democrats need to be very careful about what they wish for when they want president Trump to go away. We have worse waiting in the wings.

Might I suggest that you take a moment and read/listen to or view some Martin Luther King this weekend. His words are everything we need now: uplifting, resonant, powerful, positive, human, moral, thrilling, emotionally-charged, and truthful.

We used to have that.

For more, go to www.facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives or Twitter @rigrundfest

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Donald Trump Donald Trump Featured

Report: Trump Literally Did Not Understand The Effects of A Shutdown

This country is ran by idiots, plain and simple… and quite frankly, scary!

The Trump administration’s shutdown of the federal government over the last two weeks is a synecdoche for the way it has run the federal government over the last two years. They blundered into it almost by accident, without any understanding of what they are doing nor any plan for success.

Just as Trump did not expect to win the election and neglected to plan for his transition, he shut down the government on a whim, after right-wing media complained about his plan to approve a government funding bill. Nobody in the administration had a clear understanding of just what a shutdown would entail. Two devastating reports in the Washington Post over the weekend detail the horrifying scope of their ignorance. The administration did not realize that 38 million Americans lose their food stamps under a shutdown, nor did it know that thousands of tenants would face eviction without assistance from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Administration officials “recognized only this week the breadth of the potential impact,” reports the Post, and was “focused now on understanding the scope of the consequences and determining whether there is anything they can do to intervene.” First Trump shut down the government, and then the Trump administration started looking into what effect this would have.

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Donald Trump

Shutdown Follies: Business As Usual

Wait a minute. I thought the point of the conservative movement was to shrink the federal government down to the size where it would “drown in the bathtub.” Why are the Republicans so worried about keeping the government open and fear the public’s backlash?

Perhaps because, despite their disdain for government services and their blatant disregard for how many Americans interact with their government, they know deep down that blame for this shutdown cannot be placed on a Senator from New York whose name means nothing to most people.

In short, the Republicans and Donald Trump own this shutdown and they know it. Well, I can’t really be sure what the president actually knows, but I imagine that in the quiet of a commercial break while watching FOX News, someone has told the president that this doesn’t look good for him and that his reputation as a deal maker is drowning in the bathtub.

Was this avoidable? Of course. All shutdowns are avoidable if both parties are willing to give something up. And it certainly looked like the discussions between the president and Senator Chuck Schumer were gathering some momentum yesterday afternoon with Schumer willing to say yes to some funding for the wall that I thought Mexico was supposed to pay for. In return, the president was willing to agree to a deal for the Dreamers.

What I imagined happened was that the immigration hard liners then spoke to the president and convinced him of the apparent folly of treating children – who were brought here by there parents – as nothing less than scoundrels and criminals. Especially the ones who went to college, have respectable lives and love this country every bit as much as an ignorant nativist like Steve King. Whom most people have never heard of. See what I mean?

Most people want a deal that allows the Dreamers to stay and most people do not want to spend $18 billion dollars on a wall that will do nothing to stop people from coming to this country illegally. Most people want responsible border security. Most people want the government to fully fund the Children’s Health Insurance Program. Most people want a strong military.

In a Congress where a $1.5 trillion dollar hole in the budget is not a problem, haggling over these programs amounts to a Mt. Washington of hypocrisy, full of violent winds, plunging temperatures and dangerous precipices. Add to that a blizzard of Republican accusations that shutting down the government amounts to a repudiation of the mandate of the people as demonstrated in the 2016 election, you know, the one where over 3 million more people voted for Hillary Clinton, and you have a situation where the GOP looks a bit hypocritical.

I have no doubt that there will be a deal soon, but it won’t solve any long term problems. That’s the problem with swamps. The mosquitoes will always find more blood and stagnant water.

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Politics

House Republicans and Democrats Agree to Massive Spending Bill

Call them “small government Republicans.” Just hours before the 12 am deadline, the Republican controlled House of Representatives passed their version of a massive $1.1 trillion spending package.

The accord was reached just hours before the midnight deadline, in a 219-206 vote, amid the last-minute brinkmanship and bickering that has come to mark one of Congress’s most polarized — and least productive — eras. The legislation now heads to the Senate, which is expected to pass it in the coming days.

The split in the Democratic Party dramatically burst into view when Representative Nancy Pelosi, the minority leader and one of President Obama’s most loyal supporters, broke with the administration over a provision in the bill that would roll back regulation of the Dodd-Frank Act, which Ms. Pelosi said was a giveaway to big banks whose practices helped fuel the Great Recession. She spoke on the House floor in the early afternoon, expressing her strong opposition to the bill.

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Politics

This Video Explains Some of The Pork Packed Into The Government Spending Bill

With another Government Shutdown looming tonight if Congress cannot figure out a way to do their job and pass a spending bill, let’s take a look at some of the utter nonsense Republicans and Democrats packed into said spending bill – a massive $1.1 trillion spending package that would fund the government through September.

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Politics

John Boehner Blames The Republicans for The Government Shutdown – Video

The House Speaker and leader of the Republicans went on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno last night, and explained that the government shutdown of 2013 was a wrong move, and that the blame was squarely on the backs of the Republicans.

Boehner also explained that he told his “colleagues” not to shut down the government, but the chose not to listen.

“I told my colleagues in July that I don’t think shutting down the government over Obamacare was going to work, because the president ‘I’m not going to negotiate.’ So I told them in August, ‘Probably not a good idea.’ Told ‘em in early September.”

“But when I looked up,” he told Leno, “I saw my colleagues going this way. And you learn that a leader without followers is simply a man taking a walk. So I said, ‘You want to fight this fight? I’ll go fight the fight with you.’ But it was a very predictable disaster.”

“So the sooner we got it over with the better. We were fighting for the right thing, but I just thought tactfully it wasn’t the right thing to do.”

“Some members,” he continued, “I have to be the big brother figure. Some, I have to be the father figure. Others, I have to be the dean of students or the principal. Some of them, I have to be the Gestapo.”

“There’s nothing I could do that was ever conservative enough for them.”

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Politics Rick Santorum

Rick Santorum Turns On Ted Cruz – His Shutdown “Did More Harm” Than Good

Former senator and Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) criticized Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) for the partial government shutdown, admitting Cruz “did more harm” than good with his attempt to defund President Barack Obama’s health care law.

“I would say that in the end he did more harm,” Santorum said during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. “I think it was not his objective. I think his objective was a laudable one.”

Prior to the shutdown, which left hundreds of thousands of federal workers furloughed without pay for over two weeks and cost the U.S. economy an estimated$24 billion, Santorum voiced support for Cruz’s plan to tie anti-Obamacare measures to the government funding bill.

“It’s too soon to tell whether the strategy has worked or not, will it move the debate this way? But I think that’s really ultimately, what I think Ted’s is trying to accomplish and I think he’s certainly is pulling out all the bullets to get it done,” Santorum told CNN in September.

However, on Sunday, Santorum said Cruz’s plan failed in its execution.

“I think he didn’t do a very good job in pointing [his objective] out,” Santorum said. “It’s one thing to have a goal, and another thing to have a plan to get you to that goal, and he didn’t figure that out.”

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ObamaCare Politics

Ted Cruz Wants You to Trample on Your Healthcare

In other words, Ted Cruz wants the same old Teaparty members who have already seen their prescription cost go down as one of the many benefits of Obamacare… Cruz wants these people to gather up themselves, proceed very carefully to the nearest Teaparty bus, head to Washington and trample Obamacare.

Ps. Walking canes will be stored in the back of the bus.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said Saturday that his 21-hour Senate speech was a long time, but that’s almost as long as it takes signing up on the ObamaCare website.

He was taking a shot at HealthCare.gov’s technical setbacks, referring to his 21-hour floor speech in which he attacked the law ahead of the government shutdown.

Cruz made the comment in his keynote speech at the Defenders of Freedom event in Le Mars, Iowa Saturday afternoon. 

“I seem to recall two weeks ago when every newspaper, every political TV station was saying that it is impossible for the president to delay any part of ObamaCare. You guys are nuts,” the freshman senator said. “This week, the president and the Democrats are saying ‘holy cow, this thing is really not working.’” 

President Obama, members of his administration, and Democrats on Capitol Hill addressed the website problems this week. The Department of Health and Human Services said Friday it should be running smoothly by the end of November.

Cruz said Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), who hosted the event, made a good indication that it’s a good example of ‘our president leading from behind.’

The Tea Party senator said he’s trying to build a grassroots “army” of Americans to surround the U.S. Capitol, and bring down ObamaCare

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Domestic Policies Healthcare News Politics

Sixteen Days, Thirteen Nights

What a waste of time, effort and money. During the sixteen days that the government was shut down, the United States could have been funding scientific research, analyzing economic data and providing needed services to people who need them. It could also have begun work earlier on the health care website that will obviously need almost a complete overhaul, while fending off calls to delay or scrap it by members of both parties. The shutdown only delayed the solutions, and the hope, on this side of the political spectrum at least, is that the site will be up and running more effectively by the middle of November. In the meantime, the federal government should allow the states in which it runs the exchanges to post their choices and prices so that people can simply log on and sign up when the site’s fixed.

Remember, the rollout of the Medicare Prescription Plan in 2005 was also extremely buggy. Wait, you mean that you don’t remember? That’s because it works plenty fine now. We shall get through this as well. In the meantime, we’ve wasted time.

And speaking of wasted time, there are only thirteen nights left until New Jersey voters trudge to the polls to choose between the evil we know and the better candidate we don’t know. It’s been an odd week for the governor as he’s had to face this news…

Despite those marks, the poll shows voters disapprove of the way Christie has handled two issues they cite as among the most important in the state: the economy and taxes. Only 42 percent approve of his handling of the economy and jobs, while 38 percent approve of his performance on taxes.

while also gaining an endorsement from the Newark Star-Ledger that was one of the least enthusiastic in recent memory. It seems as thought the Ledger was just following other left-leaning voices in not wanting to offend the great offender and pull punches rather than be called stupid in a YouTube video.

It really is a terrible state of affairs that Democratic candidate Barbara Buono, who actually has a positive plan to run the state and will stay in Trenton for the next four years, has had such trouble getting her message out. She’s compassionate, tough, and respectful, things the present governor is not so much of. Now that the Senate special election is over, the Buono-Christie race has a clear field ahead of it. With negatives in the two areas that most New Jerseyans care the most about, Buono has a chance to score some points and gain in the polls. That the state and national Democratic Party will sacrifice her to the gods of money and opportunity is one of the great sell-outs of all time.

It’s the season of scary, and the thought of more GOP power in the statehouse and nation fits it very well. This year, though, the cry will not be boo, but boo-hoo. Oh, what could have been.

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Mitch McConnell Politics

Another GOP Government Shutdown? McConnell Says No! Ted Curz Says Why Not

After the spending deal last week that reopened the federal government through early 2014, Republicans tried to ease concerns Sunday about the possibility of another shutdown in just a few months.

Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the chamber’s top Republican who helped broker the agreement, said that although he disliked the new health care law — the sticking point in the latest impasse — there was no use in Republicans’ trying to roll it back while Democrats control the Senate and the presidency.

“There will not be another government shutdown,” he said on the CBS program “Face the Nation.” “You can count on that.”

But Senator Ted Cruz, the Texas Republican who was criticized by many in his own party for prolonging the gridlock, called last week’s budget agreement “terrible” and did not rule out another shutdown.

“I would do anything, and I will continue to do anything I can to stop the train wreck that is Obamacare,” he said on ABC’s “This Week.”

Republicans backed away from their push to defund President Obama’s health care law on Wednesday, agreeing to a deal to reopen and finance the government through Jan. 15 and allow the government to continue borrowing money through Feb. 7.

Breaking News
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Politics

President Obama’s Morning Message -Back to Work

The President:

Last night I signed legislation to reopen our government and pay America’s bills. Because Democrats and responsible Republicans came together, the first government shutdown in 17 years is now over; the first default in more than 200 years will not happen.

These twin threats to our economy have now been lifted, and I want to thank those Democrats and Republicans for getting together and ultimately getting this job done

Video

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Politics

GOP Should Call It Quits – Fox News Now Against Them

John McCain and Rep Steve King have questioned their party’s decision to shut down the government following the instructions from first year Senator Ted Cruz. That wasn’t expected but it was good to see. When anyone from the most partisan Republican propaganda machine begins to question the wisdom of the shutdown, then you know the Republicans are in deep dodo.

That is what happened when Fox’s Gretchen Carlson interviewed Representatives Devin Nunes (R-CA) and Adam Smith (D-Wa) about the recent Republican government shutdown.

Republicans finally accepted the proposal from Congress and reopened the government last night, but yesterday when this interview took place and everyone knew the details of the Senate proposal, the Democratic Representative pointed out the fact that the House could have accepted this same proposal since the beginning of the shutdown. Smith said, “the shame of it is, this is something we could have done back in the beginning of October.”

This is where the impossible happened. The Fox News host agreed that the shutdown was a failure in the eyes of the sane American citizenry.

“Isn’t this what Americans hate quite frankly, about you guys, members of Congress?” Carlson asked. “That this is something that could have been done long ago and here we are again?”

When Fox News gets it right, then you know you’ve really messed up!

Video

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