Why I Am Glad the Federal Government Shut Down

The shutdown of the federal government is a shameful display of incompetence in governance by the United States Congress. This shutdown could only happen through a failure to reach basic agreement about basic policy questions. Someone couldn’t do their job, and the whole organization had to close its doors.

This will cost billions of dollars in real hard cash to the American workforce, and billions more in social capital from lost reputation. Could you imagine if Apple or Microsoft had to shut company doors for two weeks because the Board of Directors and CEO could not agree on how to provide health care to employees? Their stock value would instantly crash through the floor.

Most of this comes from hard-line conservatives who are more concerned with scoring political points with their base then actually running a government. If you want to take away healthcare from the American people because you don’t like government benefits: fine. Get enough votes, and elect a president, who will sign off to change the law.

Democrats are not immune: they could just throw some of the less hard-line Republicans a bone on the medical device tax (which most Democrats want out anyway), let them declare victory and move on. Instead, the hard-line conservatives throw a fit and play chicken with the world economy, and the Democrats draw a line in the sand to make sure they don’t look weak.

So, with this clearly negative view about the shut down, why am I feeling so grateful?  

I have been thinking about National Parks shutting down, from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial that held Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have  Dream Speech,” to the gravestones of World War II veterans at a memorial on the beaches of Normandy. I’ve been thinking about almost every scientist at NASA cleaning out their desk, shutting down the computers that will one day guide us to new planets and stars. I think about all the stacks of unprocessed visas for immigrant students coming to enrich American innovation, all the shuttered day care centers for military families, all the business people waiting impatiently for their license applications and mortgage approvals.  

And when I think of all these things, it makes me grateful that they are there to be shut down.  I am grateful for so much of what the federal government does. Because it did open the door to civil rights for all. Because it did take us to the moon, and back. Because every man and woman standing at attention in the military is a federal employee. Because it does protect our rights, our economy, and our country. Because it is so successful that every country of the world is affected by its action.

And that is because the federal government is our government. The American government. The government of the people, by the people, for the people, that did not collapse in spite of foreign tyrants or internal turmoil; that did not fall when the world economy collapsed in the Great Depression; that has never in over 200 years surrendered to personal dictatorship; that has continuously withstood the open and withering self-criticism for which free speech and democracy provides; and has retained its vitality and stability for longer than almost any other country in the world.

So yes, I am grateful for the shutdown, because only when the electricity goes off do you appreciate how much it provides for you when it is on. It is nice to take some time in the candle-light, and to know that we can manage for a time without it. But anyone who has watched “Revolution” on TV knows that a nation in perpetual black-out would be a terrible place to be.  Ask the people of Afghanistan, or Eastern Congo, what is like when the federal government collapses. Ask about the starvation, the violence, and all the radical extremists this insecurity produces.  

Here in America, we don’t have to agree on Obamacare. We don’t have to agree on whether Medicaid is causing too much dependency or not. We can have a reasonable debate about the size and scope of the federal government, balanced by the equal importance of local say, and local rights.

So as the shutdown goes on, and we see more and more what it is like when the lights are off, let’s take some time to appreciate it. Our government is flawed and imperfect. But it is our government, the American Government, and one for which we can be sincerely grateful.