Why Is The U.S. Government Facing A Shutdown?

The answer is the Republicans and Democrats are fighting over power and each blames the other. The claim by the Republicans is that it's over crazy spending but what is crazier spending than the U.S.'s three wars?

The Republicans speak of slashing such social programs as Planned Parenthood and Public Radio as a poor use of money but a few days of the Iraq or Afghanistan Wars would easily pay for those programs and many others.

Reality is our nation is now dependent on massive military industrial spending and millions of jobs hang in the balance, all of them at taxpayer expense. That's why for all the talk of cutting spending, the military spending is never on the table. Yet we can't solve our financial problems without cutting this spending at least in half. But spineless politicians won't touch it, instead putting the costs on the credit card, until such time as we can't borrow any more money.

But if we must have a shutdown, under U.S. law, only what is deemed "essential" can continue. Therefore, is it essential for the U.S. to still borrow and print money to fund its wars?

Is it essential to continue to pay a king's ransom to operate the Green Zone? Is it essential to continue to pay Blackwater, Halliburton and other "private contractors" an additional king's ransom to fight? Is it essential to keep paying others to torture prisoners? Is it essential for U.S. drones to keep bombarding Afghanistan and for U.S. missiles to keep hitting Libya? Is it essential to operate Guantanamo? As by far the world's biggest purchaser of weapons of mass destruction, is it essential for the U.S. to continue its massive procurement?

Or would a lack of funding force the U.S.'s many conflicting interests to rethink and to withdraw from all the craziness they have unleashed on the world? For example, would military industrial bosses see bankrupting our nation so they can make huge returns for their investors and big bonuses for themselves is too high a price to pay?

Would Congressmen look at the all the dead and maimed and conclude all the military industrial jobs are not worth the price? If so a shutdown would let the U.S. start to regain its financial and moral sanity while letting a war weary world start to heal itself.

Dick