Day 9:  Federal Employees Held Hostage

Just when you think things can’t get worse, they do.  Apparently, start-up breweries waiting for permits from the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau are in limbo due to the shutdown, according to the Associated Press.  This also affects applications for new products and labels from existing craft brewers.  Way to stifle innovation, guys.  But I doubt if members of Congress care.  They all probably just drink lite beer anyway.

No New Suds courtesy ABC News

Day 8:  Federal Employees Held Hostage

The lunacy continues.  Rand Paul says it’s “irresponsible” for the President to talk about the government defaulting on the debt.  Whatever.  For me, the bigger questions are:  Do Kentucky voters support him because he looks like Stan Laurel?  And could somebody give the man a comb?

Rand Paul video courtesy Huffington Post

Day 7:  Federal Employees Held Hostage

I'd vote for a dog trainer over these incompetents.

Robert Randles, furloughed electrician

Ft. Bragg, Fayetteville NC (courtesy L.A. Times)

I realize Mr. Randles was simply trying to express his contempt for Congresspersons, but he may have struck upon a great idea.  I’m married to a dog trainer, and I can tell you that they are sharp people who understand behavior and how to change it.  Of course, dogs may be easier to train than members of Congress--they’re certainly a lot smarter and more pleasant to be around--but I have seen my wife work a few miracles with some fairly dangerous curs.  So maybe the answer is to send a few dog trainers into Congress to perform a bit of behavioral modification.  Perhaps they should start with the “quiet” command.  A little less yapping by these louts would be a positive development.

Read the entire article at the L.A. Times

Day 6:  Federal Employees Held Hostage

So, after several stressful days of posturing and finger-pointing, Congress has taken Sunday off.  Too bad so many of them spent the day on talk shows blaming each other for their collective incompetence.  But while Falco waits patiently for some interesting development, I’ve decided to post a truly odd poem that promises to bore to tears anyone who doesn’t like baseball.  Baseball fans will probably yawn, too.  But it’s over there to your right on the side-bar, if you’re interested.  And I, for one, think it’s rather appropriate for the times.

Day 5:  Federal Employees Held Hostage

It’s a big old goofy world.  John Prine

WTF?  So the only thing our legislative branches and the President can agree on is that us furloughed workers deserve to be paid for not working?  How does this make any sense?  Yes, the government has always done this after past shut-downs.  Note, that’s AFTER past shut-downs!  I understood freezing our pay for three years.  I didn’t like it, but I understood that it’s part of trying to get a handle on the deficit (not a significant step, but that’s a different issue).  But this now tells us it’s not about the money at all.  Maybe it’s really about making people hate federal workers more than they already do.  Prohibit us from working (yes, they tell us it’s against the law to work unless we’re declared “essential”) but promise to pay us anyway.  I guess the next rallying cry will be “take back that money you paid civil servants for not working!”  Given that any legislation that reopens the government, if we ever get such a resolution, will probably only be for a matter of weeks, this should make for more great political theater (comedy? farce?) as we approach the Christmas and New Years holidays.

Back Pay courtesy Huffington Post

John Prine's Big Old Goofy World on youtube

Day 4:  Federal Employees Held Hostage

I’m non-essential.  What do I do that’s so unimportant?  Well, among other things, I try to make government workers aware that they need to be careful about technology that can be used to spy on us.  If they ever bring me back, maybe I should talk to Mitch McConnell and explain what it means when you’re “all wired up.”

Mitch McConnell "All Wired Up" courtesy Huffington Post

Day 3:  Federal Employees Held Hostage

“It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native criminal class except Congress.”    Mark Twain

So none of this is really new.  We’ve been governed by self-serving dolts for a long, long time, as the quotation from Mark Twain more than 100 years ago shows.  But when a congressional fathead like Neugebauer from Texas confronts a Park Ranger who, unlike him, isn’t getting paid right now, it’s just sad.

Congressman Bullies Park Ranger from NBC News