THOMAS SOWELL: WHO SHUT DOWN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT?
SAN ANGELO, Texas — Even when it comes to something as basic, and apparently as simple and straightforward, as the question of who shut down the federal government, there are diametrically opposite answers, depending on whether you talk to Democrats or to Republicans.
There is really nothing complicated about the facts. The Republican-controlled House of Representatives voted all the money required to keep all government activities going — except for Obamacare. This is not a matter of opinion. You can check the Congressional Record.
As for the House of Representatives’ right to grant or withhold money, that is not a matter of opinion either. You can check the Constitution of the United States. All spending bills must originate in the House of Representatives, which means that congressmen there have a right to decide whether or not they want to spend money on a particular government activity.
Whether Obamacare is good, bad or indifferent is a matter of opinion. But it is a matter of fact that members of the House of Representatives have a right to make spending decisions based on their opinion.
Obamacare is indeed “the law of the land,” as its supporters keep saying, and the Supreme Court has upheld its constitutionality. But the whole point of having a division of powers within the federal government is that each branch can decide independently what it wants to do or not do, regardless of what the other branches do, when exercising the powers specifically granted to that branch by the Constitution.
The hundreds of thousands of government workers who have been laid off are not idle because the House of Representatives did not vote enough money to pay their salaries or the other expenses of their agencies — unless they are in an agency that would administer Obamacare.
Since we cannot read minds, we cannot say who — if anybody — “wants to shut down the government.” But we do know who had the option to keep the government running and chose not to.
The money voted by the House of Representatives covered everything that the government does, except for Obamacare. The Senate chose not to vote to authorize that money to be spent, because it did not include money for Obamacare.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid says that he wants a “clean” bill from the House of Representatives, and some in the media keep repeating the word “clean” like a mantra. But what is unclean about not giving Reid everything he wants?
If Reid and President Barack Obama refuse to accept the money required to run the government, because it leaves out the money they want to run Obamacare, that is their right. But that is also their responsibility. You cannot blame other people for not giving you everything you want. And it is a fraud to blame them when you refuse to use the money they did vote, even when it is ample to pay for everything else in the government.
When Obama keeps claiming that it is some new outrage for those who control the money to try to change government policy by granting or withholding money, that is simply a baldfaced lie. You can check the history of other examples of “legislation by appropriation,” as it used to be called.
Whether legislation by appropriation is a good idea or a bad idea is a matter of opinion. But whether it is both legal and not unprecedented is a matter of fact.
Perhaps the biggest of the big lies is that the government will not be able to pay what it owes on the national debt, creating a danger of default. Tax money keeps coming into the treasury during the shutdown, and it vastly exceeds the interest that has to be paid on the national debt.
Even if the debt ceiling is not lifted, that only means that government is not allowed to run up new debt. But that does not mean that it is unable to pay the interest on existing debt.
None of this is rocket science. But unless the Republicans get their side of the story out — and articulation has never been their strong suit — the lies will win. More important, the whole country will lose.
4 comments:
Tax money is collected under coercion from the people who do not want to pay it.
Real money doesn't exist, it's all fiat unless it's coins or bonds or other items from the US Mint or US Treasury.
Money made from nothing should not be able to purchase anything.
It is our energy that is used to make the something and we are given the nothing to by the something we just made.
Every dime those people vote to be spent, means someone has to expend their life energy to make it happen.
They were not given the 'God powers' to decide the future of our children and grandchildren such that they decide they need it now and decide the life of the future will work to settle that debt.
The life of the future is not here to say "No, I don't want to pay for that!"
Right now we are the future and there are things we have said, "No we don't want to pay for that!" We have said it and the money was spent anyway. So it's about time they either listen to us or realize they cannot make us pay for anything we don't want to.
If they want to pay for it, they can represent their self and put their pay and energy behind it, but to make us do something we don't want to do means they are not representing us any more. They are forcing us to do things against our free will.
Threat, Force, Coercion in any agreement invalidates the agreement.
So what they were elected for two or 4 year terms. If they violate the agreement they can't keep the office they were 'trusted' with.
In God We Trust? Well they better do something different, like they have done now, because there may be a man standing somewhere making them do things for that man, but that man can't make them make us do things we don't want to do.
Why is there a man behind the man?
A power doesn't need to stand behind anything to be a power.
Proof that it is an illusion of a power because it has to hide or it will be revealed the power is not there. It's only by what someone will do for the hidden that makes the hidden appear powerful.
One powerless man can stand behind 10 men who have no conscience and the 10 men can do unconscionable things and everyone will think it was the powerless man that did it.
That's the deception, but as with all deceptions, you don't see it if you don't know what to look for, and you only look where other people point to for you to look. Then if you repeat the story, you are part of the problem. The powerless helping the powerless stay in power because they are repeating the story of the power that doesn't exist because they heard it from a 'reliable' source.
Thanks for this post. I will send it on to some representatives in government so they will hold on their position to defund Obamacare.
None of this shit matters, IT"S NOT OUR GOVERNMENT !!
The republicans have a responsibility to fund a program the American people want. This post is called "spin."
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