Help! My Government Shut Down

When I got into the creation of Project Kinect, I purposely stated that all political and religious views would stay out of this purely so that it can be as objective as possible.  I am taking time to observe and listen so that we can all get to know each other. However, on a day like today, after two months of protesting and requesting that the politicians we all voted in do hear what their constituents have to say, where our government is about to shut down because they cannot pull it together, I feel my opinion needs to come out a little bit. 

Yesterday reporter Lisa Ling tweeted “Congress, get your shit together”. Now, it is almost nine thirty on the east coast and no deal has been made.  When the government shuts down, what happens you ask?  Well, certain things keep going like air traffic, armed forces of course(without a paycheck), and we still need to print money so the Department of Treasury does not get turned off. 

Unfortunately, the people we have elected have some morals so while they continue to get paid while the government gets shut down; everyone who works for them does not and gets an unpaid vacation.  In addition to them, no visas or passports can be approved, all national parks would be closed, the Center for Disease Control(CDC) would be closed as well as the center for toxic waste.  These are just a few of the many ways that the public, the very people that voted in these ego-saturated politicians, would suffer once the government shuts down this evening.

When I was back running restaurants, if something shut down, that meant I would have to call someone in and get it fixed.  Who can we call right now to fix our shut down government?  We don’t have anyone. We only have ourselves so we have to climb up the ladder, grab the manual, and figure out what we need to do to get our broken government up and running again.  Once it is up and running, we need to find a way to hold our government responsible for what they did.  They’re lack of responsibility and integrity cost us time and money as a country and we need to remember that they work for us.  If I call a repair man in to fix equipment and it breaks down again the next day, I call him, request he comes back and fix the problem correctly this time. As a result, I do not pay him extra labor fees because he didn’t complete his job the first time.  He is being held responsible for his mistake. Our government needs to be held responsible because I repeat, they work for us!  We, the voters, are the majority in this country.  Not the rich, not the politicians, but us, the very people voting them in, buying their goods. 

As we approach midnight, and our government gets shut down for whatever amount of time it may be, remember that we have to hold them responsible.  We have to hold them responsible for this incident, for what they promised us to get them the vote, and to ensure that this never gets to code orange again let alone code red because that is what this is, code red.  We have a government that isn’t fully working and we need to get it working again.

I included some links to that talk about government shut down as well as a link to what the 2010 budget looks like.  I also added, just for your viewing pleasure, a link to government salaries.  It helps to know how much our voted officials are getting paid.  Unfortunately, this doesn’t have all the ways they are getting paid, but that is for a different conversation.  Happy Shut Down All!

 

 
What Happens If the Government Shuts Down?

U.S. Congress Salaries

U.S. 2010 Spending Budget