What the Government Shutdown Means For You

With the threat of a federal government shutdown growing with each passing day, it’s important to understand what functions would and would not continue operating after this Friday if Democrats and Republicans can’t reach a last-minute compromise. The list below is by no means complete, but provides at least a partial accounting of some of the far-reaching effects of a shutdown:

WON’T SHUTDOWN: the US Postal Service is considered self-funding, so mail will continue to be delivered. However, paychecks for millions of government employees and contractors will not be sent out, so postal workers will have slightly less mail to sort through.

WILL SHUTDOWN: all national museums, parks, memorials, cemeteries, and historical sites will be closed to the public. The Park Police will still patrol the monuments to ensure that nobody takes any pictures or listens to music on their headphones though.

WON’T SHUTDOWN: the IRS will continue to collect taxes, so don’t feel like you can slack off as tax day approaches next Friday, but if the government owes you money, don’t hold your breath waiting for your tax return. Meanwhile, The Federal Reserve will still continue to print worthless currency to fund the existing debts of the United States.

WILL SHUTDOWN: all non-essential government offices will be closed and it will be a fire-able offence for government employees to attempt to do any work during a shutdown. Some agencies are even exploring ways to remotely shut down the ubiquitous blackberry phones wielded by government employees.

WON’T SHUTDOWN: Metro will continue to run at full capacity even if all the trains are empty. Plush Union contracts will also guarantee that even though nobody is riding metro, senior employees will continue to accrue overtime hours while not fixing the broken escalators at Farragut West.

WILL SHUTDOWN: all personnel aboard the International Space Station will be requested to enter deep hibernation until the budget situation is resolved. Operation of the space station will be transitioned over to control by a new computer system called “HAL 9000.”

WON’T SHUTDOWN: the Sun will continue to shine. US Department of Agriculture farm subsidies will continue to be funded under the “provision of payments” clause which defines essential government functions. However, all federally-subsidized solar power plants will have to be pointed away from the Sun, unless the weather is cloudy.

WILL SHUTDOWN: the Moon will go dark and the tides of the ocean will cease. Functions of the commerce department relating to measurement of oceanographic phenomena will be suspended and as mentioned previously, NASA will be closed. During the shutdown, only the dark side of the Moon will be visible. The Earth will also stop spinning and fire and death will rain down from the heavens.

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The Last Day of Winter

For Catholics and many Protestants, today is the last day before the fasting and penance of Lent. Known variously as Fat Tuesday, Mardi Gras, or Shrove Tuesday, this is a day that started as a celebration and anticipation for the joy of Easter but has lately become another commercialized excuse for bad behavior. However, what many people have forgotten is that today is also the last day of winter--or at least it should be.

A popular urban legend has it that spring does not begin until March 20 this year. In recent years, calendar makers and the mainstream media have popularized the misguided idea that the equinox is the precise moment that winter ends and spring begins even though the changing of the seasons is a natural and gradual process that cannot be exactly predicted from one year to the next.

As the name implies, March is a month of changes, so instead of an abrupt switch at March 20, evidence that the process of spring has already begun is everywhere. That process is reminiscent of the adage that March “comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb.” The high winds and freezing cold of February are already giving way to the verdure of spring.

We now live in an age where, for the first time in the history of the world, a majority of people live in cities and are detached from nature, so it is easy to understand why this urban legend has become so popular. Worse still, we are now subjected to faux-intellectual clichés such as the perennial, “it’s snowing in December but it’s not even winter yet.”

Such oxymoronic statements are evidence that the choice of any particular date for the beginning of each season is at best arbitrary. However, if we must choose a date, Ash Wednesday seems as good a choice as any, especially if we consider that the word “Lent” is derived from the old Germanic word for "spring." In the Mid-Atlantic region, this is a particularly good fit for the reasons below.

From a meteorological standpoint, the coldest and snowiest days of the year run from the first week in December to the first week in March:

1) In the Mid-Atlantic region, the average daily temperature drops to its lowest level almost exactly at the midpoint between December 1 and March 1, not at the midpoint between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox. Although temperatures are different, the midpoint of the temperature curve is similar in other regions.

2) Comparing daily temperatures for December and March, almost every Day in December is colder than the same day in March.

3) Average daily snowfall is highest in the throughout the months of December to February, not from December 20 to March 20.

From a botanical standpoint, deciduous plants start growing in late February and go into dormancy around early December:

4) The first blooms of spring--especially crocuses and daffodils--can be found in early to mid-March, or sometimes even late February, well before the vernal equinox.

5) Depending on location, the changing leaves achieve their peak color in late September through early November and start to fall very soon thereafter.

6) The average date of the last overnight frost of spring, and thus the time for planting crops ranges from mid-February in the South to mid-May in the Mountain West. Thus, the equinox is actually closer to the midpoint of spring from an agricultural standpoint.

From a cultural and historical standpoint, the season of spring has always included most or all of the month of March and possibly even February, whereas Summer is understood to begin in June, May, or even late April depending on who you ask:

7) Groundhog Day (or Candlemas) which is celebrated on February 2 is a tradition which sometimes results in a proclamation of “early spring.” Although the predictions of Punxatawney Phil and his cousins are wildly inaccurate when compared to actual weather data, the tradition is nevertheless a recognition that mild weather sometimes comes before March 1 and certainly long before the vernal equinox.

8) As mentioned above, Lent, which is derived from the Germanic root for "spring," begins between February 4 and March 10, but the average date of Ash Wednesday is on February 21.

9) Especially in the South, Easter is the first day it is considered acceptable to wear white pants, shoes, etc. which are traditionally associated with summer. The average date of Easter is on April 8.

10) Similarly, the feast of the Nativity of St. John is a popular holiday celebrated across Europe in late June which is known as midsummer, implying that spring has already ended and summer has begun long before the summer solstice.

11) The name of March comes from ancient Rome, when March was the first month of the year and named Martius after Mars, the Roman god of war. In Rome, where the climate is Mediterranean, March was the first month of spring, a logical point for the beginning of the year as well as the start of the military campaign season.

12) Data going back to 1974 indicate that retail prices for gasoline are higher on average for the months of May through September because the summer months are traditionally associated with car trips and vacations.

Finally, from a bureaucratic standpoint, no agency or body of the United States government has ever declared the solstices and the equinoxes as the “official” start and end of the seasons:

13) According to the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration which falls under the U.S. Department of Commerce, Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1 to November 30 and thus coincides exactly with the traditional dates for summer and fall.

14) According to the Energy Information Administration which falls under the U.S. Department of Energy, the “winter heating season” runs from October 1 through March 31 and thus corresponds to the traditional dates for winter, with some extra padding on either end. The midpoint of the winter heating season is December 31.

15)The U.S. Naval Observatory which falls under the U.S. Department of Defense, provides a listing of the exact times for the equinoxes, solstices, perihelion, and aphelion which is titled “Earth’s Seasons” but does not state that these astronomical phenomena are in any way the “official” start or end of the seasons.

16) By law, Daylight Saving Time (DST) now starts on the second Sunday in March and ends on the first Sunday in November. Prior to 2007, when the new law went into effect, DST started on the last Sunday in April and ended on the last Sunday in October. Just as the government definition of “winter heating season” includes padding on both ends of the traditional season, so too does DST includes padding on either end of the traditional summer season. The midpoint of DST is in mid-July.

In summary, the folklore of the equinox as the first day of spring is a modern idea which did not become fashionable until very recently. The idea has been popularized in the last few decades, because the exact times of certain phenomena are variable and can only be noted after they have occurred. At the same time the dates of many phenomena such as the last frost or peak fall leaves vary across the vastness of our continent.

However, instead of relying on the false precision of the astronomical equinox, we should base our understanding of the seasons on natural phenomena that we observe around us. Indeed, at this moment here in Virginia, the first tender green leaves and pink buds are coming out on the trees and shrubberies, the grass is starting to turn green again, and chirping birds are once again heralding the arrival of sunrise. Regardless of what the calendar makers would have you believe, spring is here.

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The Man with Two Faces

With an announcement today of a “federal property board” to evaluate and propose the sale of federal assets, President Obama demonstrated again his impeccable gift for exceptionally poor timing.

"For too long red tape and politics have prevented the government from moving forward on these fronts," the official said, adding that the board was expected to return $15 billion over the first three years in operation.

The White House estimates there are around 14,000 federal properties designated as excess, plus thousands of others which are either no longer needed, or are underutilized.

Democrat Obama, under intense pressure from his Republican opponents to cut government spending and narrow a budget deficit estimated at $1.645 trillion this fiscal year, is trying to squeeze savings by making the government more efficient.

This announcement comes just as members of Congress from Montana and Idaho are bringing legislation to the floor that would require Congressional approval before permanently closing federal lands to mineral and energy exploration.

Rehberg said his bill is needed because it was revealed last year that the Department of the Interior was planning to declare millions of acres in Montana as a national monument. "This 'Treasured Landscapes' plan relied heavily on input from a few special interest groups and seeks to abuse the Antiquities Act for the presidential designation of National Monuments across the west, including Montana," Rehberg said.

Thus, the Obama Administration is proposing the sale of federal property—although presumably only in urban areas—to generate a mere $15 billion over the next three years while at the same time closing off millions of acres of federal land to lucrative uses such as lumber, mining, cattle grazing, and energy drilling. According to the Bureau of Land Management’s own website:

The public lands provide significant economic benefits to the Nation and to states and counties where these lands are located. Revenues generated from public lands make BLM one of the top revenue-generating agencies in the Federal government. In 2007, for instance, BLM’s onshore mineral leasing activities will generate an estimated $4.5 billion in receipts from royalties, bonuses, and rentals that are collected by the Minerals Management Service. Approximately half of these revenues will be returned to the States where the mineral leasing occurred.

A savings of $15 billion is trivial compared to the overall deficit and is made even more laughable when compared to the loss of federal revenue for the use of public lands. The duplicity of this maneuver is enough to shock even the most cynical observer of national politics.

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Updated: Bonfires of Liberty are Spreading

Ignited by the successful "Jasmine Revolution" in Tunisia and then fueled by the successful ouster of Mubarak in Egypt, the bonfires of liberty are spreading and bringing light to every corner of the Arab world. After long suffering, the people of the region know that their time has come, and they are choosing freedom. Even Iran and Libya are seeing a reignition of protests after past suppression.

The policy choices for the Obama Administration will be difficult in the short term, but overall, these democratic revolutions are in the best interests of American foreign policy. By supporting the fight for freedom everywhere, we can regain our reputation as a force for good in the world and also remind ourselves of what is at stake on our own shores.

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Mubarak's Lie

Bloody clashes in Cairo yesterday and today suggest that President Hosni Mubarak is gambling that he can convince his people and his erstwhile Western allies that his regime is the only thing standing between relative calm and stability and the catastrophe of a full-blown Islamic revolution similar to Iran under the Ayatollah or Afghanistan under the Taliban. However, this is a false choice both for Egypt, and for Muslim nations around the world.

After September 11, America embarked on a war against the Taliban which under the so-called "Bush Doctrine" expanded into a commitment of the United States to fight Islamic extremism anywhere it is found. Opponents of this strategy argue that America should not and cannot force Western values on Muslim nations and they are correct, but only just. Liberals in America have either forgotten or rejected the notion that religion can coexist and thrive with a secular democratic government.

In truth, there are not two choices for Egypt and for the Muslim world, but three. Rather than making the false choice between theocratic and secular forms of totalitarianism, the Egyptian people can learn from the example of new democracies in Indonesia, Afghanistan, and Iraq, where the rule of law and basic human rights are upheld in parallel with a religious understanding of morality. In fact, until recently, this was the basis of democracy right here in America.

The global war on terror is more than just a fight between the West and Islamic extremism. There is another front of this war which is being waged here at home. We are not only fighting for freedom in the face of theocratic tyrants who would return the world to a mediaeval understanding of Islamic law, but we are also fighting for the core principles of classical liberal governance here at home in the face of an overwhelming and unprecedented expansion of government power.

Whether in the debates over TSA’s enhanced screening procedures or the ill-conceived "kill switch" that is again being considered in the back halls of the Capitol, the technocratic forces of modern liberalism (or progressivism if you prefer) are just as much of a threat to our freedoms as the fanatical hijackers and bombers who would slaughter the innocent. If basic rights are not protected by the force of law, it does not matter whether the government is secular or religious.

Freedom is a powerful thing, but it also demands that we have the dedication to our principles to allow people to make the wrong choices. Rather than attempting to control peoples’ lives through the endless bureaucracy of Bloomberg’s nanny state in New York or the death squads of the Islamic morality police in Iran and Saudi Arabia, the fundamental principle of Western liberal democracy is that given a healthy religious sense of morality, the people will make the right choice between good and evil.

Instead of the false choice between Hosni Mubarak and Osama bin Ladin, the Egyptian people know that there is a third way where freedom and religion can coexist peacefully. Why do we in the West doubt them? Indeed, on our money and in the pledge to our flag, we have a constant reminder that ours is "One nation, under God." Perhaps we need that reminder now more than ever.

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Bonfires of Liberty

The map above depicts countries that have successfully--or in the case of Iran, unsuccessfully--rejected dictators and instead adopted democratic forms of government. To borrow from Samuel Adams, the protests we are witnessing today are bonfires of liberty in the midst of a desert; not of sand, but of human dignity and freedom.

In his Second Inaugural, George W. Bush spoke about the need for America to promote freedom and democracy in the world as the most powerful antidote to the extremist ideology of hatred responsible for the atrocity of September 11. Ten years on, we are witnessing a wave of protests throughout the Muslim world in opposition to the forces of tyranny.

Perhaps the liberation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the success of democracy there has been an inspiration for others in the region who seek freedom. Certainly, nobody can deny the power of American inventions like Facebook and Twitter which have allowed people to circumvent the censorship and oppression of their governments and to rise up together.

The question now is, "What will Obama do?" Will he rise to this moment and stand with those who seek their freedom, or will he remain silent as he did when protests erupted in Iran? It will be the greatest failure of his presidency if these nascent revolutions are allowed to be crushed--or worse, give rise to fundamentalist regimes like the Taliban--because of his indifference.

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All The News That’s Fit To Print

An example of overheated political rhetoric.

While Congresswoman Giffords struggles for her life at a Tucson hospital, the New York Times carries on the timeless tradition of yellow journalism which was famously summarized by the quote, “You supply the pictures, and I’ll supply the war.” In what purports to be a straight news story, the writer flogs the partisan storyline that the deranged assassin, Jared Loughner, was driven to murder by the tone of political rhetoric—particularly that of the Tea Party (emphasis added):

…Over the past year, Ms. Giffords struggled in a brutal re-election campaign during which her opponent appeared in a Web advertisement holding an assault weapon. The district has become a caldron [sic] of divisions over government spending, immigration, health care and Barack Obama.

Today, the Eighth District stands apart as one of the most emotionally and politically polarized in the nation.

The rampage on Saturday that left six dead and Ms. Giffords gravely wounded may prove to be an isolated act of violence by a mentally disturbed man. The suspect attended at least one of Ms. Giffords’s town meetings before the event Saturday.

Still, the shootings came after a disconcerting run of episodes in this district of mountains and desert, raising temperatures here in a way that some of Ms. Giffords’s friends argue fed an atmosphere that might encourage violence.

According to the New York Times, Jesse Kelly—a former Marine—appeared at a campaign event with an M-16. Although this did not seem to provoke any media comment at the time, liberal pundits are now grasping on the event as proof that the gunman was inspired to kill because of it. Worse still, the use of the weasel-word “may” in the paragraph above suggests that there is some doubt that Loughner is anything but a psychopath who acted alone.

That being said, Jesse Kelly was not the only candidate in Arizona’s eighth district who appeared with a gun during the campaign. As the Washington Times reported last April, Giffords herself was photographed with an assault rifle, which the local media used to tout Giffords' bona fides on border security during the 2010 campaign.

Mr. Kelly challenged the Democrat incumbent [i.e., Giffords] for posing with an AK-47 assault rifle in an Arizona Daily Star article, with a caption that read "Today's been just another day on the border for hard line U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords." The lawmaker wears a dark jacket and brandishes the weapon, with a half dozen fatigues-clad soldiers in the background.

"It turns out the picture has nothing to do with border security and was taken during a trip to South Asia in 2009…"

The Washington Times adds that The Arizona Star removed the photo in question after the reporter who wrote the misleading caption admitted his error.

Of course, the New York Times does not mention this in their coverage of the supposed “climate of hate.” This omission can only be part of a deliberate strategy to promote the storyline that Republicans—and Republicans alone—are the party of extreme rhetoric. This ranks with the standard of “fake but accurate” that the Times employed after the Dan Rather memo scandal. In the end, that sad episode showed the world that the facts are always the Times’ undoing.

The repeated abuse of journalistic integrity suggests that the New York Times’ motto “all the news that’s fit to print” should be amended to include “and much that isn’t.” By using the tragic death of six people and the attempted assassination of a member of Congress to advance a shamelessly partisan agenda, the New York Times proves that they have no quibbles about whether or not their news reporting is fit for publication.

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