Thursday, April 7, 2011

A Compromise on the Government Shutdown

Yesterday, Bosman wrote about what would happen if there was a government shutdown. There is one line from that the story that he links that jumps out to me.
Entitlements: If a shutdown occurs, most officials say it will likely be brief, which means scheduled Social Security checks and food stamps would arrive and Medicare/Medicaid benefits would still be available-though staff might not be able to process new applications. Even in the event of a prolonged delay in funding, regularly scheduled payments will still be made. 
This is a key line. This enables all of those angry, old white people yesterday in Washington, D.C. to demand that the government be shut down  They don't care about the fact that thousands of people are going to be without work. They don't care that the government shutdown will be caused by disagreements over a few bucks worth of cuts.

That's fine. I can go along with the show as long we cut off Medicare and Social Security, which happen to be the real drivers of our nation's debt. Of course, this will never happen because then those same angry, old white people would be protesting against the government shutdown. Because they are not really conservatives. They want to cut everything that does not affect them. For them, it is not about defeating the social welfare state, for they are the biggest recipients of government doles.

So, yes, let's shutdown the government, but only if we also cut off the entitlements faucet, so we can ween these people off of their welfare. And, yes, Social Security is welfare.

Of course, I am being a little facetious, but if we are going to play this game, let's play it to the fullest. And I am not going to stand by while the Worst Generation saddles my generation with mountains of debt.

1 comment:

Revolution 2012 said...

Pablo,

These are all preliminary games. The end game though is 2012.

Both the Dems and the Reps are trying to put their best face forward to their base.

REAL reform won't happen until we have a REP Senate and POTUS to go along with the REP House.

Don't expected anything drastic to upset the applecart before the election.