A tornado or a hurricane are crises. Katrine was one hell of a big crisis! The attack by terrorists on 9/11/2001 was a crisis. A crisis is something to avoid at all costs if at all possible. The government shutdown is certainly a crisis in the sense it is a disaster at hand and a prelude to an even large disaster to come. It is not a crisis in the sense that it was wrought by circumstances or persons out of the usual controls.
The government shutdown is A MANUFACTURED CRISIS! Lest there are normal folk or media personalities (can't really call them "reporters" anymore for they do not investigate but simply parrot whatever they are told) who still hang on to the belief or perpetuate the nonsense that "both parties are responsible" for this so-called crisis, let us be very clear: This is solely the doing of the Republicans in the House of Representatives who seem to be under the spell of a group of far-right nogoodniks who care not for their oath of office or their country but live only to serve some deranged ideology which comes more from Ayn Rand than James Madison.
These traitors (and I use that word deliberately, for they have failed to keep their sworn oath, and it is now clear they are publicly working to undermine the system of government set forth in our Constitution), who appear to actually believe their own lies and misconstructions, are bent on destroying the good faith and credit of these United States in order to achieve some short-term political goal, although even they are not sure of what that goal is.
They dislike the Affordable Care Act, which many millions of Americans have never heard of and know only as Obamacare. They have shown they will do literally anything to dismantle the ACA and "bring Obama down" (a promise made by Boehner and McConnell just 5 short years ago!).
Because the ACA, in its present form, is based on a similar health care proposal put out a few years ago by the increasingly ultra-conservative Heritage Institute and became the basis for Romney's signature healthcare law when he was governor of Massachusetts, this willingness to create financial havoc on a global scale in order to do away with what was a Republican plan makes no sense.
But their demand to dismantle the ACA makes no sense in another sense. The ACA is the law, duly passed by Congress, signed by the president, given Constitutional authority by the Supreme Court. In our country, we do not, via some sort of fiat, do away with laws of the land. We do not obey and or follow the laws we like and disobey or ignore the laws we don't like. If there is a law we feel is unfair for some reason or another, there are Constitutional methods of amending or negating that law. We do not use extortion to get our way!
The traitors in the House of representatives are extortionists and thus very, very dangerous to our system. This shutdown is not merely a financial fiasco but a political disaster and shows in no uncertain terms how far our government has fallen. It also means that we have a serious breakdown in the hinterland. Our country is filled with ignorant and stupid people who voted in the representatives responsible for the crisis!
President Obama cannot give in to the demands of these traitors for he would lose his dignity and authority and make a mockery of the presidency. Even more serious, extortionists never quit. If they are successful in one case they will continue their extortion. Tomorrow there will be another law these traitors do not like and again will use their power to shutdown the government to achieve their goal of say, dismantling the Environmental Protection Agency.
The more I think about this the more I believe the word, "traitor," is an apt name. We might even add "terrorist" for tonight in this great land, thousands of families will have a parent recently unemployed; some will go hungry, others will be unable to pay their rent; more people will suffer the dread of not knowing what terror tomorrow will bring them at the hands of these traitors and terrorists in Washington!
Some final thoughts: this is a manufactured crisis. It is not something that happened to us but rather was created by persons who are supposed to represent our best interests. Yet it does the exact opposite! It is a needless exercise in political pique!
Secondly, the Republicans don't give a rat's ass about the people of this country, no matter how many tears Mr. Boehner manufactures to make us think so. They don't care about healthcare; they don't care about the 47% or the 99%! They're afraid that if the pending provisions of the ACA take effect they are done for because the people will realize the Republicans have sold them a bill of goods about Obamacare!
So, we can only conclude other more sinister forces are at work. You will note that most of the teapot crackpots involved in manufacturing this so-called crisis come from the deep South and Texas! These are areas where racism is the norm not the exception. These areas remain pockets of unrepentant Confederates who have yet to concede the Civil War is over and who cannot abide the thought of a black man in the White House!
But because racism is everywhere, Obama remains a problem in every area where the people refuse to believe that when Jesus said "love your neighbor as yourself," he meant black or brown neighbors, too.
And we must not forget that these areas of our country are also where the schools are least effective. Texas, for example, is at the bottom of almost every educational scale. Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, are also bottom feeders! In other words, ignorance reigns. In these states many folks reject science and live by mythologies - evolution is inconceivable, Adam and Eve were real people, they are god's chillun and the rest of the world are heathens and thus, suspect.
Ignorance breeds stupidity. Stupid people elect stupid representatives. That's why the state of Georgia elected a Republican member of the House of Representatives who had the unmitigated gall to stand up and say "You lie!" to the president of the United States! But even Minnesota has enough stupids to elect Michele Bachmann! There are too many stupids everywhere!
For the moment, it seems the stupids are in control. But they need not be. There are still a few Republicans who sense that the cliff looming ahead is not going to lead to a perfect view but a disastrous fall. The crisis, being created, can be easily and quickly dismantled if the few intelligent and responsible adults left in Congress can gather the courage to do what is right. The crisis is not necessary.
The Democrats are not responsible. President Obama is not responsible.
The crisis we call the government shutdown derives directly from Republicans in the House of Representatives. They are the problem. Perhaps the people will wake up and make sure they are never re-elected to any public office again.