Our most recent federal government shut down reminds me of “Stuck In the Middle with You” by the band Stealers Wheel. The words “clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, here I am stuck in the middle with you” from the song perfectly sum up the chaos and gridlock in Washington.
If federal civil servants face periodic furloughs, so too should White House employees, members of Congress and their staff. Most federal employees work just as hard as their counterparts in the private sector. Many in the military, FBI, United States Marshals, ICE and Border Security put their lives on the line every day protecting our nation. They remain on the payroll, but some suffer from a delay in their pay.
A majority of federal employees had already requested annual leave to take some days off during Christmas and New Year’s week prior to the furlough.
Many have use or lose annual leave that exceeds the maximum 240 hours that can be carried over from one year to the next. They are forced to take time off or forfeit accumulated leave.
Even when furloughs take place, Congress has ended up retroactively paying federal employees for the days they could not report to work. Don’t believe the hype of elected officials who demagogue on this issue.
The White House, Senate and congressional offices will all also be managed by skeleton staff during this same time period. Life will go on.
Both the president and Congress need to work together, if we are ever going to put our fiscal house in order and end future threats of both sequestering and furloughs. We need to return to the time when Congress held budget hearings for each department during the summer.
A real balanced budget agency by agency was adopted during an open process. Members of Congress, federal employees, the public, watchdog groups and media were afforded sufficient time to understand the full contents prior to adoption. Full federal budgets were adopted on time prior to the start of any new federal fiscal year on Oct. 1. This was a time when there were no furloughs.
There are just as many good managers in the government as in the private sector. If their superiors would give them the authority and flexibility to manage budgets, they could find savings without having to consider furloughing or laying off employees.
Let’s make a deal. Democrats should give Trump $5 billion for the wall. Republicans should give Schumer and Democrats $5 billion toward the $29 billion Gateway tunnel. Both sides will come away happy.
Millions of Americans have cut far more out of their family budgets and managed to survive. Everyone knows that the thousands of Washington K Street lobbyists, representing every conceivable special interest group, work behind the scenes with the White House, Congress and congressional staffers in writing their own favored special provisions into every federal agency funding bill prior to adoption.
We can’t furlough the thousands of lobbyists who swarm around Washington like bees searching for honey. Hard-working civil servants pay taxes just like everyone else. The White House and Congress should be held accountable for their actions, or in this case inactions, just as employees are at personnel evaluations.
Voters can conduct their own personal evaluations of both Congress and the president on Election Day in 2020.
Both the president, members of Congress and their respective employees should be docked one full day’s pay for each day our pending full Federal Fiscal Year 2019 budget is not adopted on time. They need to perform this most basic requirement of their jobs, which is passing a budget on time, just like federal civil servants do on a daily basis.
Why not end bipartisan gridlock?
Instead of another in a series of stopgap continuing resolutions to keep the government open, pass a clean spending bill with no attached amendments for the balance of Fiscal Year 2019 ending on Sept. 30 using Fiscal Year 2018 numbers.
Larry Penner
Great Neck
