Government Shutdown: The Washington Circus Pissing Contest

The big Washington DC psychodrama unfolding is a likely partial shutdown of the federal government on Friday. The quality of the “debate” is in the mold of America’s favorite reality shows. A comparison could be made between the government shutdown chicken-game played by the political class and the scripted reality of any “Real Housewives” shows. No matter the local: New-York, Atlanta, Orange County and Miami, all the “real” housewives are phony, spoiled, rich women and have, for this reason, a lot in common with US politicians, and this includes the fact that they are bad actresses working on the premise of a bad script.

Politics As Spectacle

The script for Washington DC’s political drama is not much better. It is a remake of the US government shutdown circa 1995 against Bill Clinton. At the time the director was Newt Gingritch, and in the remake, the perpetually tanned John Boenher is at the helm, but the Tea Party is in charge of producing the showdown. It is of course pure theater, the dent made to the US budget deficit would be minimal and only symbolic. What can an insignificant $38 billion savings do to a ballooning budget deficit likely to run into south of $1.3 trillion?

The pissing contest is not about truly addressing the budget deficit, but about the 2012 elections. The far-right GOP is now catering to the delusional far-right that is the Tea Party. The fundamentalists of the budget fight have decided that it was a good idea to cut among other things food stamps, US funding for the United Nations and US foreign aid. Needless to say, America’s warmongers shouldn’t worry: the gluttonous Pentagon will be fully financed (regardless of a shutdown) until September. Paranoiac Americans shouldn’t worry either, the police state apparatus including the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, police etc will remain fully funded and operational. The tools of repression will remain in full force, but what could be delayed in government’s niceties are unemployment benefit checks, social security payments and refunds from the IRS. Americans do not like their own politicians very much, but what will they do if we have a government shutdown, and further what will be the consequences for the political deadline of the 2012 elections?

General Strike And Protest: A Citizen Response To A Government Shutdown

Lately, just about everyone in the world had a day of rage. While the Arab Revolution has spread like wild fire across North Africa and the Middle-East, Americans have remained mostly passive. Millions of people are loosing their homes to corrupt financial institutions reaping the benefit of Wall Street’s elaborate Ponzi scheme. Some have called the Arab Revolution the Arab Spring, and as the world is percolating with revolutions and protests the contagion could reach what communists used to call the United States of America: the “heart of the beast”.

Americans have been indoctrinated into thinking that at the foundation of the United States a revolution took place. However, America’s revolution didn’t qualified as such, it was instead a colonial war against the British empire. In the process of the so called American revolution, the land/slave owners kept control of the levers of power. They had the land, the free labor force and the revolution didn’t change a system based on social inequality. A revolution is supposed to change the social order, but in the US it never did.

America is a top heavy social structure, as 2 percent of the population controls 50 percent of the wealth. Yet, with a budget in complete disarray the vaguely reasonable Republicans in the US Congress have been taken hostage by the Tea Party. But if you are poor or belong to the withering middle-class, you can only expect your miseries to worsen. Quite often, progressive Democrats voters complain that their elected politicians who do not have a spine. They should take a closer look in the mirror, and consider how passive they have been. If citizens, and taxpayers, want their voice to be heard they should do it now. It couldn’t be a better time, after all it is tax season. If it isn’t a day of rage on April 15 when tax returns are due, it could be postponed to May 1st if Americans decide to show their strength by protesting their broken government.