Shutdown Blues

Two weeks into a government shutdown, and I am feeling pretty uncomfortable. I am not by any means a political expert and there are two things I do not want to bring into my blog: politics and religion. I don’t want to stand on a soap box and tell anyone how they should vote, pray, or otherwise think when it comes to these two matters. All I want to say is what happened guys? This is not the country that our founders imagined. We have made some wonderful advancements over the years as a nation but things are looking pretty dismal right now. I guess the saying is true: the frog in the pot doesn’t know the water is being heated until it really is too late. Are we at that point?

I have a neighbor across the street who has now been working on Fort Riley without pay for two weeks because she is an essential DoD civilian. This is after several weeks of sequestration in which she had to take furlough days without pay. So after several weeks of pay cuts she now gets no pay but still goes to work. She and her husband, both veterans, also face the possibility that their VA benefits will be halted in November due to the shutdown. They have children to support, and groceries, fuel, and utilities are not cheap in the Fort Riley area. I am not asking for sympathy or for people to question the fairness of it all. I am saying “Hello! This is messed up!” We are at the point where we are sucking the life out of people who served their country unquestionably, who are now paying the debts of people unwilling to pull their own weight. We as a nation caused these problems. Veterans and DoD civilians are just half the story; consider entrepreneurs now facing the effects of government involvement in the normally functional capitalist system. And now we are all in a position where our government is arbitrarily taking rights and privileges from us without our consent. Does anyone else feel the water getting warmer?