Let's make the government shut-down permanent

Discussion in 'Political Opinions & Beliefs' started by Blackrook, Oct 2, 2013.

  1. Blackrook

    Blackrook Banned

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    Republicans wanted smaller government and now we've got it. All "non-essential" government employees have been sent home. Why should we ever put them back to work, when they are "non-essential"?

    Let's make the government shut-down permanent.
     
  2. hseiken

    hseiken New Member

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    Only if it includes the following:

    Shutting down air traffic control.
    Defunding military
    Stopping pay of all federal congress members and aides.

    You know for a fact if the shut down actually included these things, those doofus GOPers wouldn't have shut down a *******n thing.
     
  3. Gorn Captain

    Gorn Captain Banned

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    The intelligence agencies had to cut back on 70% of their staffs.

    So....why do Tea Partyers want the terrorists to win???

    :)
     
  4. SFJEFF

    SFJEFF New Member

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    All civilian employees at military bases have been furloughed. That includes all the civilian employees hired to do the work to free up military staffing.

    Oh and it also means that every National Park in the system is closed- because those employees are considered 'non-essential'.

    Another fine Conservative recommendation.
     
  5. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    Look at you, holding the nation ransom with government monopoly positions. Fire the air traffic controllers and privatize? Or just force the planes out of the sky?

    Don't blink, but you sort of just admitted you know which programs are essential and which are not.

    - - - Updated - - -

    You guys have been doing a great job against al Qaeda already these last years. Releasing GITMO prisoners so they can wage a jihad against us. If no one is working day and night to release terrorists how will we ever survive?
     
  6. hseiken

    hseiken New Member

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    No planes. No one's going anywhere. No 3 o'clock tee-time flights from DC to Virginia. I'm saying that if the government shut down actually affected those perpetrating it, they'd not have even considered it. Since it doesn't directly affect them but still affects around nine hundred thousand jobs, they're just collateral damage.
    Don't blink, but you sort of just admitted you know which programs are essential and which are not.

    The GITMO prisoners were presumed innocent after being illegally detained based on NDAA. That's all. They're free to go, but are still being held there. Again, by NDAA.

    Bush and Obama can high five each other for that huge debacle.
     
  7. Blackrook

    Blackrook Banned

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    The Republicans in the House have passed bills to fund the VA, veteran's hospitals, national parks and monuments, and the District of Columbia. The Democrats in the Senate have shot these down. Why do the Democrats in the Senate want people to suffer needlessly?
     
  8. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    You didn't hear about all the terrorists we released that went back to it? If they can't be taken as POWs don't you think the military will just kill them?

    So the plan is to monopolize certain industries then use that power to harm the nation? You should be a union organizer.
     
  9. hseiken

    hseiken New Member

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    The list is alleged. Actual research into only 12 'confirmed' released detainees revealed names that weren't even on any official detainee lists. So the lie is either in the list of names or the fact that the people released aren't 'returning to the battlefield'. As well, Dick Cheney was the biggest perpetrator of these allegations and he's not the most trustworthy neo-con out there.

    [/quote]

    No, the idea is that if there's going to be a government shut down, it better affect actual governmental bodies, such as congress and white house officials and hit them anywhere else they depend on government for their daily business such as air travel. If you're going to do a shut down, do it right and make it hurt the people it should hurt. Although I don't like temporarily shifting the 800k people temporarily without a job from one industry to another, at least this industry affects every american and especially every politician on capital hill, which is where I think the biggest wastes have been happening as of late. Each one of those dudes makes more than 100k a year to be an (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*)(*).
     
  10. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    How many operatives of equal level have we added this year to our captured level?

    Agreed

    agreed, except to security

    no, they can just allow the private sector to do it and the people wont have to suffer. Government hould not have the power to attack its own people in order to extract money simply because it created a monopoly.

    agreed, bit you expanded it.

    Most of the people furloughed are making that bank too with benefits added in. The government workers are well paid and will continue to be and they never have to sell their labor to someone paying with their own mony unless they leave so don't worry too much.
     
  11. Blackrook

    Blackrook Banned

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    The fact is, all essential parts of the government are running. Why should Republicans cave? To open a few national parks? Who cares? Not me.
     
  12. hseiken

    hseiken New Member

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    Barely any because we just bomb people without reason now. *shrug*


    When money and regulation exist on the same playing field, money always wins, regulation always fails and disastrously. As well, with no official standards, regulation, when privatized, would end up something like this:

    Government mandates industry regulates itself.
    A couple of organizations are set up independently and sell their services to meet the government requirement to be regulated in some fashion. Each one has a different level of standards. The less checks and regulations done, the cheaper the service. Therefore the regulation amounts to nothing more than a check in the box as competition for the most freedom to behave unethically will drive prices and regulation away. Eventually, it will be nothing more than a rubber stamp approval of nothing.

    I think you missed my point entirely. It was to say that government shut down means nothing to the people shutting it down because it doesn't affect them. They're playing with other people's lives and don't care. That was my point of expanding the shutdown to include the very people invoking it. It would mean more to the principles for which the GOP claims to be standing for if they decided to not get paid and be further inconvenienced as well. Principles cost money. Hostages don't.

    [/quote]

    Maybe, maybe not. Depends on what service they're working in. For instance, Smithsonian workers are still getting paid. The EPA members are not.
    It's literally on a service by service basis. And making bank? The fore-mentioned Smithsonian worker pay averages (based on Bureau of Labor Statistics) cites mean pay of museum staff to be around 40k a year. Not exactly bank, imo. The Coast Guard pay is equal to all other branches of military, for which base pay for it's lowest paid only slightly above poverty. Government pay for grunt jobs pays about the same as any other grunt job.
     
  13. Questerr

    Questerr Banned

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    Here's a hint of why your plan is idiotic: the astrophysicists and engineers at the Jet Propulsion Lab working on the next generation of spacecraft for NASA are "non-essential".

    The people who process new claims for the VA and the panels that work on the appeals of old cases are "non-essential".

    The entire R&D infrastructure developing new tech for the military is "non-essential".

    Really the problem is that people don't know what "non-essential" means in relation to the government.
     
  14. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    Even when you cherry pick at the low end of the pay scale it is high and unnecessary. Trusts can operate the museum. They operate plenty just fine. Can't use coast guard I have already conceded that security is a legitimate function of government, even in times of shutdown. You win, I would agree to restoration of their funding.

    If the states could get the tax money from their citizens the fed is taking they can handle their environmental problems better then the EPA. Shut it down, that would be just fine. Would have had the Indian river lagoon fixed decades ago.
     
  15. onalandline

    onalandline Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    The government shutdown is not that big of a deal. It is bloated. Folks are just too used to an over-sized, over-reaching government. Things are still happening.
     
  16. hseiken

    hseiken New Member

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    I simply don't see how. Companies don't get paid to clean up their messes, so it's none of their concern and a company won't simply own land unless it profits them somehow.
     
  17. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    The states care about their land and are faster then the Feds. When the Feds take so much the states lose out. Companies can be sued if they do not. Don't forget about attorneys. They do more then government.
     
  18. onalandline

    onalandline Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    The government would still be up and running if the Dems weren't so stubborn.
     
  19. Blackrook

    Blackrook Banned

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    I would be willing to give it all up if it would pay down the debt. Our government is $17 trillion in debt. We need to start saying "no" to people if we're ever going to pay that debt down. If that means we stop going to Mars, and stop building the newest laser to kill people with, then I say great, let's pay down the debt.

    The Republicans in the House passed a bill to fund the VA, and the Democrats in the Senate killed it.
     
  20. Questerr

    Questerr Banned

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    If the government was downsized in a series of planned stages, I would agree with you.

    Simply chopping off the government's legs with no anesthesia, no antiseptic, and a rusty kitchen knife is not a good idea.

    If something isn't done soon to remedy this, there is going to be fall out. The market doesn't like uncertainty and it doesn't like chaos. The government has acted as a stabilizer for the private sector for decades. It is one of the largest consumers on Earth of private goods.
     
  21. hseiken

    hseiken New Member

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    I see, seemed like you implied by privatizing the area would fix it. Your reasoning seems sound on this to a large extent. However, in the past, state enforcement of environmental issues was spotty at best. Some did it well, others didn't give a flying flip.
     
  22. Questerr

    Questerr Banned

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    What makes the VA more "essential" than military R&D?

    You may be willing to see this country burn because you are ignorant of how the government interacts with the market, but I'm not. This shutdown needs to end. Then when it's done, we need a Constitutional Convention and a PLAN for shrinking the government.
     
  23. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    In the past people didn't know what they know today about costs. Also when you are starving who cares about swamp land. With Wealth comes the luxury of a clean house.

    I say the Feds should take care of their land, the states their land, the courts handle interstate disputes and the courts again to settle disputes between private interests polluted on.
     
  24. Questerr

    Questerr Banned

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    How can companies be sued when lobbyists have done their damned to make sure their bought and paid for state politicians have passed "Tort Reform" laws?
     
  25. Blackrook

    Blackrook Banned

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    No.

    Enough of your phony promises that you will talk with us later about shrinking the government.

    Talk with us NOW.

    Obamacare is the biggest abortion of a law ever passed and even Jimmy Hoffa says so. He say's its killing the 40-hour workweek and breaking the back of the middle-class.

    Let Obamacare die as the first step towards fiscal sanity.
     

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