Making Sense By Michael Reagan

It’s almost like the news media is trying to get us to hide under our beds in fear.

From CNN to USA Today to Fox and beyond, all we hear is, “There’s a shutdown! There’s a shutdown!”

Of course there’s a bloody federal government shutdown.

It’s the end of September, isn’t it? It’s federal budget-passing time, isn’t it?

It’s the season when our great political leaders in Congress finally have to stand up tall and decide who in the federal government will get the tens and hundreds of billions of dollars we don’t really have and will be borrowing for our grandchildren to pay off.

For most Americans, shutting down the federal government means nothing. First off, it’s an empty threat that rarely ever happens – the last time was 10 years ago. (America survived, by the way.)

Almost every year at this time we hear the same scary and sad media stories about the threat of federal parks closing and federal employees – aka, bureaucrats – being furloughed and not getting their paychecks until the deadlock is over.

But shutting down the federal government for a few days or even weeks doesn’t seriously affect the lives or the livelihoods of most Americans.

If it weren’t for the big TV networks and print dinosaurs like the Washington Post acting like it was the end of the world, most Americans wouldn’t even know that the federal government has been closed for the last two days.

It’s the usual story – the usual dumb “government shutdown” story that I swear I’ve written about 10 times before. The characters are just a different collection of spineless and incompetent Republicans and Democrats in Congress who can’t or won’t make the right decision.

As usual, instead of sensibly passing a multi-trillion budget to fund the federal government one small chunk at a time, they kicked the entire 2025-2026 budget can down the road like a gang of little kids until the fiscal deadline – September 30.

This year the funding fight is over the extension of enhanced Obamacare subsidies, but it’s always something partisan and stupid. Democrats okayed a similar bill nine months ago, but they won’t OK this one largely because they hate President Trump so much they can’t see straight.

So now the Schumers and the Thunes and Johnsons and Jeffries are pointing partisan fingers of blame at each other.

They’re trying to force the other side to capitulate and sign a gigantic one-piece omnibus budget bill that contains all the legislative crap, boondoggles and self-serving bills both parties couldn’t get passed on their own during the year.

No one knows how long this latest self-inflicted shutdown “crisis” will last – probably into next week. And you can bet any settlement will just push the next budget showdown “crisis” back to Thanksgiving week or on Christmas Day.

Meanwhile, the propagandists at CNN are already writing hysterical things like “The ramifications of Capitol Hill’s deadlock are steadily rippling across a broad swath of American lives.”

As examples of these supposedly dire threats to American lives, CNN pointed out that New York can’t afford to keep the Statue of Liberty open and the DC court system won’t be able to issue marriage certificates.

CNN and everyone else in the media’s shutdown spook show know how this one will end. Everyone in the federal workforce will get their back pay. And America will survive, despite the predictable failures of Congress.

If we really want to stop these seasonal shutdowns, I’ve got an idea that might help.

How about a piece of legislation that says when a government shutdown occurs, the first nonessential federal “workers” to lose their pay are members of Congress?

It’s hard to be optimistic, given Congress’ sorry track record, but I’m looking for a member of the Senate or House who has enough courage to write it – and a party that has enough courage to pass it.

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Copyright 2025 Michael Reagan, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Michael Reagan, the son of President Ronald Reagan, is an author, speaker and president of the Reagan Legacy Foundation. Send comments to [email protected] and follow @reaganworld on Twitter.