Dear LazyJournal

[evwhore]

Honest question, because I only skimmed stuff last night and have not read in depth yet this morning: do the jackoffs (and I am not singling any group out, I mean all of them) not get paid during the shutdown, or do they have some special exemption? If the latter, that shit ain't right

Comments

[wild_irises]

They get paid. They are not funded through annual appropriations.

[luckylefty]

I'm curious. If a majority of the House says "we refuse to pass any CR unless it also does X", and sticks to that no matter what, then does that mean that the Senate are jackoffs if they don't pass a resolution that does X? Does it depend on the value of X, and if so, what's the criterion for deciding for what values of X this is true?

I think the idea that "If X and Y fail to reach a compromise, both X and Y must therefore be behaving badly" is a false and very dangerous one. Once you say the blame is always shared, you reward the side that makes completely unreasonable demands and refuses to compromise on them; either their demands are granted, or they are blamed no more than the other side for the stalemate and whatever bad results the stalemate causes (shutdown, default, or whatever).

[clutch_c]

Usually the party that says both parties are to blame is actually the party that deserves all the blame.

[evwhore]

I think the idea that "If X and Y fail to reach a compromise, both X and Y must therefore be behaving badly" is a false and very dangerous one.

Except that's not what I said (other than calling them all jackoffs, which is arguably true anyway, and rhetorical license otherwise)

"they all lose their jobs" is *punishing* them all equally, which is not the same as blaming them all equally. Even if one side is solely to blame, presumably they are just as eager to keep their jobs.

Sure, it's an imperfect and unfair punishment, but the idea is that it is hopefully effective enough a threat that it never actually needs to be applied.

[luckylefty]

If one side says "we refuse to compromise; any solution that we agree to must involve doing X", where X is totally unreasonable, why is it a good thing to punish the other side, and pressure them to do X, since that is the only thing they can do to resolve the situation is to do X.

No-one is in congress for the salary. The good ones are there to make a difference, and could get much more money as lobbyists or "consultants". The bad ones are putting in their time in congress, to allow them to get lucrative lobbying and consulting jobs later, at 10 times their congressional salary. So cutting salaries would be a purely symbolic act.

As to the strategy of "let's set up a mechanism where if compromise doesn't occur, something neither side wants happens", isn't that exactly what was tried with the sequester?

[dmorr]

I think one of the many riders that showed up in the recent house bills was to make it so that congress and the president didn't get paid during a govt. shutdown.

My guess is that if they pass an otherwise clean bill with just that rider, it'll pass.

[gunga_galunga]

Of course the jackoffs get paid. A few of them are "donating" their salary to charity to try to improve the optics.