— from Rep. Rick Larsen’s office —
WASHINGTON, D.C. –Rep. Rick Larsen (WA-02) issued the below statement regarding the impacts a partial government shutdown will have on Washington state communities.
“A partial government shutdown is bad for Washington state,” said Larsen. “The childish games played by President Trump and Republicans in Congress will cause Washington state organizations and our communities to feel the consequences of a shutdown.”
“I have heard from local organizations, like the Bellingham Food Bank, U.S. Department of Agriculture Service Center in Mount Vernon and Volunteers of America Western Washington, a partial shutdown will negatively impact operations, including their ability to provide funding for transportation, distribution and storage of food.
“This shutdown is unnecessary and will impact the thousands of workers who will now spend the holidays working without pay, especially the federal transportation personnel who will support the estimated 45 million passengers travelling during the holidays.”
Local Impacts of a Partial Government Shutdown
- Bellingham Food Bank is an emergency food assistance distributor. A shutdown will impact their operations and ability to transport, distribute and store food.
- A shutdown would close the USDA Service Center in Mount Vernon, which provides support for farmers and rural communities.
- A long-term shutdown could impact Volunteers of America Western Washington’s operations and harm their ability to help the people they serve.
- Washington State Department of Transportation will need to delay Federal Transit Administration grant payments during a shutdown.
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This annual “shutdown” theater is symptomatic of our Representative Republic having been hijacked, by our elected representatives. Melodrama and politics have successfully supplanted the good intentions of our founders. Sad.
Relatively speaking (and putting yourself back at that time with what was happening politically in the world), the founders did a phenomenal job; they didn’t accidentally fasten together a government and the principles that anchored it as did so many other continents who unexpectedly seized upon opportunities to escape their colonial masters (South America from Spain, for example). No, our founders were an extremely literate, knowledgeable and rather worldly, well-read group who quite deliberately decided their fates and, for example, a distinct stand against simple majoritarian rule given empirical evidence at the time (the abuse it so easily occassioned in Europe). The challenge for successive generations was to improve society via innovation while not grow dumber in fundamental skills—by remaining inquisitive, curious, independent in thought and always willing to stand apart and up for the little guy (or the minority) on principle. The founders knew education was instrumental in succeeding where they left off yet fastened together a government that could withstand much in the way of slacking off. Where a good minority of folks are excelling today, larger numbers are slacking off for reasons that inconvenience too many to address honestly. Such is one description of today’s state of affairs. Ever larger growing numbers are simply living off the fumes of our forebears and couldn’t build much less maintain the country that still is but mostly was.