When this whole Speaker of the House Fight came up (Yes, I’m calling it a fight), I thought to myself, “This won’t last but a few days. The United States House of Congress members will figure this out. We can’t get bills passed. We can’t get work done without a Speaker of the House.” Let’s not leave out the fact that in a matter of days, the U.S. government is under threat, again, of a government shutdown because of our lawmakers not being able to agree on the budget.
First acknowledgment–I “thought” wrong because it’s been more than a week and the men and women elected to serve our nation on the Republican side, by and large, can’t seem to come to a consensus on the candidate that both parties can live with, knowing that Republicans are in control of the House, number-wise.
The second acknowledgment as we go forth with this Civics 101 lesson about electing a Speaker of the House is that while this drama plays out in our nation’s capitol, we have Israel and Hamas at war against each other, with U.S. troops now being sent over to the middle east to “help” Israel and there’s still a war being waged between Russia and Ukraine.
Let’s look at the threat of a U.S. government shutdown and what it can mean.
When there’s a government shutdown, thousands of federal government employees are put on Furlough, meaning that they are told not to report for work and go unpaid for the period of the shutdown–although their salaries are paid (retroactively) when it ends.
Other government workers who perform what are judged essential services, such as air traffic controllers and law enforcement officials, continue to work but do not get paid until Congress acts to end the shutdown.
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