When The Government Shuts Down
By Mitch Berg
Since there is talk that the federal government will shut down this weekend, it’s Shot In The Dark’s job, as the Twin Cities’ best source of news, to tell you what to expect.
With Austan Goolsbee and the Council of Economic Advisors busy looking for work at McDonalds, President Obama will go on a deficit spending spree four times as huge and damaging as that of his predecessor.
With the Department of the Treasury shut down, US currency will cease to have any value. All sales and purchases in the United States, from the transfer of Mortgage Backed Derivatives to buying Tic Tacs at the gas station, will be transacted by old-fashioned barter of goods or services. Cigarettes will become the primary unit of currency…
…except that without the Department of Health and Human Services to mandate the warning labels, there will be no cigarettes.
With the Department of Education furloughed, all schools (public and private) in the US will be sold at sheriff sales and turned into union-staffed Community Centers.
With the Department of Housing and Urban Development wandering the streets from bar to bar, public housing in the United States may become blighted and undesirable.
With the Attorney General looking for work as a community organizer with ACORN, brigades of government lawyers will be forced to seek honest work. As prostitutes.
With the Department of the Interior not functioning, national parks will become covered with grass and animals.
Vice President Joe Biden will actually have to seek work in a coal mine.
If you’re a veteran? Without Veteran’s affairs, you won’t be anymore! All that service to the country…gone!
With Commerce closed for business, no business can take place. But that won’t matter, because with the Department of Labor closed, nobody will do any work at all.
With Hillary Clinton’s State Department sitting on the beach in Norfolk, the United States will become reviled around the world.
With the Department of Agriculture lying fallow, there will be no more food. We will all starve.
You might think the price of oil will drop, since without the Dept. of Transportation, we will all be utterly immobile. But it won’t matter, since without the Department of Energy, there will be no oil.
With Homeland Security shuttered, only the terrorists will be able to mindlessly vex and grope you.
The the entire chain of command on the unemployment line, the Army’s tanks will immediately rust away, the Navy’s ships will careen out of control into bridge abutments, and all nuclear missiles will spontaneously fire, plunging the world into nuclear winter.
Whew. Could be ugly!
April 8th, 2011 at 5:59 am
I’m starting to worry that Boehner is going to cave! Michelle Bachmann has been stating over the past couple of days that she was confident that there would be a “deal.” To me, that translates into The GOP is caving-Again! I sent an email to Sen. Boehner last night, telling him that although I wasn’t one of his consituents, I looked to him as the leader of the GOP. I then put in caps “no deals!”, reminding him of the past back stabbing that the Dims have done and that no compromise from our side is ever enough for them. I closed by stating that they needed to quit using a scalpel for budget cuts, because they need a stump grinder!
I hope that the message gets through.
April 8th, 2011 at 6:55 am
You might want to mention that women and minorities will be hardest hit.
April 8th, 2011 at 8:09 am
The entire country will move to Galt’s Gulch and live happily ever after.
April 8th, 2011 at 11:19 am
“..brigades of government lawyers will be forced to seek honest work. As prostitutes.”
Doesn’t seem like much of a career change. (wink)
April 8th, 2011 at 12:53 pm
Rush played a soundbite of our Senior Senator, the Hon. Amy Klobuchar, speaking and relating the story that when ‘she went through the metal detectors, something she always does, the deputy sheriff there said/asked ‘They aren’t going to take our birth control away are they?’ To which our Senator responded: no they aren’t going to take away your birth control.’ ( as best as I can quote from memory)
I think the hon. Senator is inventing or embellishing things. Why would a working deputy sheriff need support from the Federal government in order to use birth control? Surely the county for which she works pays enough that the deputy could afford to buy a box of condoms, or even pay for the birth control pill. Wouldn’t a sheriff’s department even have a medical plan which likely also pays for birth control pills. And wouldn’t the metal detectors that the Senator would be passing through, more likely be run by the Capitol Security police, a federal agency?
April 8th, 2011 at 1:13 pm
Loren, Amy is worried that global warming is going to harm the Arctic penguin population because they are so sensitive. Look up Arctic penguins.
April 8th, 2011 at 1:28 pm
Kermit,
I found the entry on the Artic penguins. It was next to the article on Antarctic polar bears.
April 8th, 2011 at 1:34 pm
If Androgynous Amy said this you can bet it is pure B.S.
April 8th, 2011 at 3:18 pm
Yes Loren. It is cross-referenced with Obama’s energy policy.