Shutdown reaches shameful zone
As the government shutdown reaches a record 33 days, we are entering a more shameful zone, where federal workers are relying on donated food and some are about to lose their homes, their vehicles, and their livelihoods.
The sad part is that there is no end in sight for the standoff. Both the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House are scheduled to vote this week on bills to reopen the government, but neither offers a viable solution to end the shutdown.
President Donald Trump shut down the government because the majority Democrat House of Representatives refused to give him $5 billion for a wall he wants to build on the U.S. American border. Trump had promised during the election that he would build a wall on the southern border and would make Mexico pay for it. Mexico rebuffed his demand, and now he is seeking taxpayers money to building the wall.
It is a shame that the President of the United States and the U.S. Congress are holding federal workers and their families hostage to get what they want. They are punishing hard-working Americans because Republicans and Democrats cannot agree on how to fund the government.
And instead of focusing on reopening the government, Republican senators and their majority leader are working to approve a bill giving Israel $38 billion for military aid. The Houe is scheduled to vote on it soon.
It is unfair that federal workers are not getting paid and the president and congresspersons and their staff continue to get paid. Some government contractors will never recover the money they have lost over the past 33 days.
If the government is shut down, the president and congresspersons should make their own coffee, and clean their own offices, hallways, and bathrooms until they end the shutdown.
Putting families in jeopardy and gambling with people’s lives for political gain is abuse at a colossal scale. It is beyond abuse; it is inhumane and barbaric.
The sad part is that a good number of Americans either support the president or support his democratic opponents. The rest seems to be in a coma. The media is busy trying to pit one side against the other.
The president’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump describes the misery that federal workers are enduring as a “little pain.” It is easy for her to say that. She is married to a billionaire and does not have to worry about paying her mortgage and feeding her family. Federal workers do not need your sympathy. They need to get paid for a job they are doing.
How about being reasonable and reopen the government and then find a solution to the problem. We urge both sides to return to their sanity, reopen the government and negotiate.
